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<Jr 


WORKS  BY  ROBERT  Louis  STEVENSON 

AN  INLAND  VOYAGE. 
EDINBURGH:  PICTURESQUE  NOTES. 

TRAVELS  WITH  A  DONKEY. 

VIRGINIBUS   PUERISQUE. 

FAMILIAR  STUDIES  OF  MEN  AND  BOOKS. 

NEW  ARABIAN  NIGHTS. 
TREASURE  ISLAND. 
THE  SILVERADO  SQUATTERS. 
A  CHILD'S  GARDEN  OF  VERSES. 

PRINCE  OTTO. 

THE  STRANGE  CASE  OF  DR.  JEKYLL  AND  MR.  HYDE 

KIDNAPPED. 

THE  MERRY  MEN. 

UNDERWOODS. 

MEMORIES  AND  PORTRAITS. 

THE  BLACK  ARROW. 

THE  MASTER  OF  BALLANTRAE. 

FATHER  DAMIEN:  AN  OPEN  LETTER. 

BALLADS. 

ACROSS  THE  PLAINS. 

ISLAND  NIGHTS   ENTERTAINMENTS. 

A  FOOTNOTE  TO  HISTORY. 

DAVID    BALFOUR. 

WEIR  OF  HERMISTON. 

VAILIMA  LETTERS. 

FABLES. 

SONGS  OF  TRAVEL. 

ST.  IVES. 

IN  THE  SOUTH  SEAS. 

WITH  MRS.  STEVENSON 

THE  DYNAMITER. 

WITH  LLOYD  OSBOURNE 

THE  WRONG  BOX.      THE  WRECKER.       THE  EBB-TIDE 
[See  also  end  of  volume] 


«CSB  U3RARV 


R.  L.a 


THE    POCKET 

iv.  JL.  S. 

BEING    FAVOURITE 

PASSAGES      FROM 

THE       WORKS       OF 

STEVENSON 


NEW    YORK 

CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S   SONS 
1919 


Copyright,  1891,  1892,  1893,  1895,  1896,  1897,  by 
CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 

Copyright,  1891,  by 
ROBERT  LOUIS  STEVENSON  and  LLOYD  OSBOURXE 

Copyright,  1894,  by 
ROBERT  LOUIS  STEYEXSON 

Copyright   1895,  by 
STONE  &  Kl.MBALL 


NOTE 

THIS  little  book  has  been  compiled  for  the 
use  of  those  who  love  Stevenson  and  call  him 
Master.  It  conceals  no  elaborate  attempt  to 
condense  his  writings  within  a  single  volume; 
but  to  those  that  know  his  books,  and  like 
them,  it  may  perhaps  be  found  a  pleasant 
companion  on  a  summer's  day  ;  recalling,  by 
a  favourite  passage  here  and  there,  the  un- 
seen pages  on  the  book-shelf  at  home. 


SELECTED    PASSAGES 


"\~\  7"HEN  you  have  read,  you  carry  away 
*  with  you  a  memory  of  the  man  him- 
self;  it  is  as  though  you  had  touched  a  loyal 
hand,  looked  into  brave  eyes,  and  made  a 
noble  friend ;  there  is  another  bond  on  you 
thenceforward,  binding  you  to  life  and  to  the 
love  of  virtue. 

T  T  is  to  some  more  specific  memory  that 
•••  youth  looks  forward  in  its  vigils.  Old 
kings  are  sometimes  disinterred  in  all  the 
emphasis  of  life,  the  hands  untainted  by  decay, 
the  beard  that  had  so  often  wagged  in  camp 
or  senate  still  spread  upon  the  royal  bosom ; 
and  in  busts  and  pictures,  some  similitude  of 
the  great  and  beautiful  of  former  days  is  handed 
down.  In  this  way,  public  curiosity  may  be 
gratified,  but  hardly  any  private  aspiration 
after  fame.  It  is  not  likely  that  posterity  will 
fall  in  love  with  us,  but  not  impossible  that  it 
may  respect  or  sympathise ;  and  so  a  mao 

A  I' 


would  rather  leave  behind  nim  chj  portrait  of 
his  spirit  than  a  portrait  of  his  face,  figura, 
anttni  magis  quam  corporis. 

PIIE   pleasure  that  we   take   in   beautiful 

£      A       nature    is    essentially    capricious.       It 

I  comes  sometimes  when  we  least  look  for  it; 

and    sometimes,    when    we    expect    it    most 

-l1'<   '     certainly,   it   leaves  us  to  gape  joylessly  for 

,Jpt      days  together,  in  the  very  homeland  of  the 

beautiful.     We   may   have   passed  a  place   a 

thousand  times  and  one  ;  and  on  the  thousand 

and  second  it  will  be  transfigured,  and  stand 

forth  in  a  certain  splendour  of  reality  from  the 

dull  circle  of  surroundings ;  so  that  we  see  it 

'  with  a  child's  first  pleasure,'  as  Wordsworth 

saw  the  daffodils  by  the  lake-side. 

T)UT  every  one  sees  the  world  in  his  own 
•*-*  way.  To  some  the  glad  moment  may 
have  arrived  on  other  provocations  ;  and  their 
recollection  may  be  most  vivid  of  the  stately 
gait  of  women  carrying  burthens  on  their 
heads ;  of  tropical  effect,  with  caves  and  naked 
rock  and  sunlight ;  of  the  relief  of  cypresses ; 
of  the  troubled,  busy-looking  groups  of  sea- 
pines,  that  seem  always  as  if  they  were  being 
melded  and  swept  together  by  a  whirlwind ; 
of  the  air  coming,  laden  with  virginal  perfumes, 
o^'er  the  myrtles  and  the  scented  underwoods ; 
o*"  the  empurpled  hills  standing  up,  solemn  and 
sharp,  out  of  the  green-gold  air  of  the  east  at 

2 


evening.  There  go  many  elements,  without 
doubt,  to  the  making  of  one  such  moment  of 
intense  perception;  and  it  is  on  the  happy 
agreement  of  these  many  elements,  on  the 
harmonious  vibration  of  many  nerves,  that  the 
whole  delight  of  the  moment  must  depend. 

"\7"OU  should  have  heard  him  speak  of  what 
•*•  he  loved ;  of  the  tent  pitched  beside  ^ 
the  talking  water ;  of  the  stars  overhead  at 
night ;  of  the  blest  return  of  morning,  the  peep 
of  day  over  the  moors,  the  awaking  birds 
among  the  birches  ;  how  he  abhorred  the  long 
winter  shut  in  cities ;  and  with  what  delight, 
at  the  return  of  the  spring,  he  once  more 
pitched  his  camp  in  the  living  out-of-doors. 

T  T  was  one  of  the  best  things  I  got  from  my 
education  as  an  engineer  :  of  which,  how- 
ever, as  a  way  of  life,  I  wish  to  speak  with 
sympathy.  It  takes  a  man  into  the  open  air ; 
it  keeps  him  hanging  about  harbour-sides, 
which  is  the  richest  form  of  idling ;  it  carries 
him  to  wild  islands;  it  gives  him  a  taste  of  the 
genial  dangers  of  the  sea  ;  it  supplies  him  with 
dexterities  to  exercise;  it  makes  demands  upon 
his  ingenuity  ;  it  will  go  far  to  cure  him  of  any 
laste  (if  ever  he  had  one)  for  the  miserable  life 
Df  cities.  And  when  it  has  done  so,  it  carries 
him  back  and  shuts  him  in  an  office  !  From 
the  roaring  skerry  and  the  wet  thwart  of  the 
tossing  boat,  he  passes  to  the  stool  and  desk ; 
3 


and  with  a  memory  full  of  ships,  and  seas,  and 
perilous  headlands,  and  the  shining  Pharos,  he 
must  apply  his  long-sighted  eyes  to  the  pretty 
niceties  of  drawing,  or  measure  his  inaccurate 
mind  with  several  pages  of  consecutive  figures. 
He  is  a  wise  youth,  to  be  sure,  who  can 
balance  one  part  of  genuine  life  against  two 
parts  of  drudgery  between  four  walls,  and  for 
the  sake  of  the  one,  manfully  accept  the 
other. 

"^T  O  one  knows  the  stars  who  has  not  slept, 
•^  '  as  the  French  happily  put  it,  &  la  belle 
{toilc.  He  may  know  all  their  names  and 
distances  and  magnitudes,  and  yet  be  ignorant 
of  what  alone  concerns  mankind, — their  serene 
and  gladsome  influence  on  the  mind.  The 
greater  part  of  poetry  is  about  the  stars  ;  and 
very  justly,  for  they  are  themselves  the  most 
classical  of  poets. 


TT  E  surprised  himself  by  a  sudden  impulse 
•*•  to  write  poetry — he  did  so  sometimes, 
loose,  galloping  octosyllabics  in  the  vein  of 
Scott — and  when  he  had  taken  his  place  on  a 
boulder,  near  some  fairy  falls,  and  shaded  by  a 
whip  of  a  tree  that  was  already  radiant  with 
new  leaves,  it  still  more  surprised  him  that 
he  should  find  nothing  to  write.  His  heart 
perhaps  beat  in  time  to  some  vast  indwelling 
rhythm  of  the  universe. 
4 


"^T  O  man  can  find  out  the  world,  says 
•^  '  Solomon,  from  beginning  to  end,  be- 
causeN^he  world  is  in  his  heart/ and  so  it  is 
impossible  for  any  of  us  to  understand,  from 
beginning  to  end,  that  agreement  of  harmonious 
circumstances  that  creates  in  us  the  highest 
pleasure  of  admiration,  precisely  because  some 
of  these  circumstances  are  hidden  from  us  for 
ever  in  the  constitution  of  our  own  bodies. 
After  we  have  reckoned  up  all  that  we  can  see 
or  hear  or  feel,  there  still  remains  to  be  taken 
into  account  some  sensibility  more  delicate 
than  usual  in  the  nerves  affected,  or  some 
exquisite  refinement  in  the  architecture  of  the 
brain,  which  is  indeed  to  the  sense  of  the 
beautiful  as  the  eye  or  the  ear  to  the  sense  of 
hearing  or  sight.  We  admire  splendid  views 
and  great  pictures ;  and  yet  what  is  truly 
admirable  is  rather  the  mind  within  us,  that 
gathers  together  these  scattered  details  for  its 
delight,  and  makes  out  of  certain  colours, 
certain  distributions  of  graduated  light  and 
darkness,  that  intelligible  whole  which  alone 
we  call  a  picture  or  a  view.  \JIazlity  relating 
in  one  of  his  essays  how  he  went  on  foot  from 
one  great  man's  house  to  another's  in  search 
of  works  of  art,  begins  suddenly  to  triumph 
over  these  noble  and  wealthy  owners,  because 
he  was  more  capable  of  enjoying  their  costly 
possessions  than  they  were ;  because  they 
had  paid  the  money  and  he  had  received  the 
pleasure.  And  the  occasion  is  a  fair  one  for 

5 


self-complacency.  While  the  one  man  was 
working  to  be  able  to  buy  the  picture,  the 
other  was  working  to  be  able  to  enjoy  the 
picture.  An  inherited  aptitude  will  have  been 
diligently  improved  in  either  case ;  only  the 
one  man  has  made  for  himself  a  fortune,  and 
the  other  has  made  for  himself  a  living  spirit. 
It  is  a  fair  occasion  for  self-complacency,  I 
repeat,  when  the  event  shows  a  man  to  have 
chosen  the  better  part,  and  laid  out  his  life 
more  wisely,  in  the  long-run,  than  those  who 
have  credit  for  most  wisdom.  And  yet  even 
this  is  not  a  good  unmixed ;  and  like  all  other 
possessions,  although  in  a  less  degree,  the 
possession  of  a  brain  that  has  been  thus  im- 
proved and  cultivated,  and  made  into  the 
prime  organ  of  a  man's  enjoyment,  brings 
with  it  certain  inevitable  cares  and  disappoint- 
ments. The  happiness  of  such  an  one  comes 
to  depend  greatly  upon  those  fine  shades  of 
sensation  that  heighten  and  harmonise  the 
coarser  elements  of  beauty.  And  thus  a  de- 
gree of  nervous  prostration,  that  to  other  men 
would  be  hardly  disagreeable,  is  enough  to 
overthrow  for  him  the  whole  fabric  of  his  life, 
to  take,  except  at  rare  moments,  the  edge  off 
his  pleasures,  and  to  meet  him  wherever  he 
goes  with  failure,  and  the  sense  of  want,  and 
disenchantment  of  the  world  and  life. 


THE  VAGABOND 
(To  an  air  of  Schubert} 


to  me  the  life  I  love, 
^-*     Let  the  lave  go  by  me, 
Give  the  jolly  heaven  above 
And  the  byway  nigh  me. 

Bed  in  the  bush  with  stars  to  see, 
Bread  I  dip  in  the  river  — 

There  's  the  life  for  a  man  like  me, 
There  's  the  life  for  ever. 

Let  the  blow  fall  soon  or  late, 
Let  what  will  be  o'er  me  ; 

Give  the  face  of  earth  around, 
And  the  road  before  me. 

Wealth  I  ask  not,  hope  nor  love, 
Nor  a  friend  to  know  me  ; 

All  I  ask,  the  heaven  above 
And  the  road  below  me. 


one  who  has  been  upon  a  walking 
'  or  a  boating  tour,  living  in  the  open  air, 
with  the  body  in  constant  exercise  and  the 
mind  in  fallow,  knows  true  ease  and  quiet. 
The  irritating  action  of  the  brain  is  set  at  rest; 
we  think  in  a  plain,  unfeverish  temper ;  little 
things  seem  big  enough,  and  great  things  no 
longer  portentous ;  and  the  world  is  smilingly 
accepted  as  it  is. 

7 


TpOR  my  part,  I  travel  not  to  go  anywhere, 
•*•  but  to  go.  I  travel  for  travel's  sake. 
The  great  affair  is  to  move ;  to  feel  the  needs 
and  hitches  of  our  life  more  nearly ;  to  come 
down  off  this  feather-bed  of  civilisation,  and 
find  the  globe  granite  under  foot  and  strewn 
with  cutting  flints.  Alas,  as  we  get  up  in  life, 
and  are  more  preoccupied  with  our  affairs, 
even  a  holiday  is  a*  thing  that  must  be  worked 
for.  To  hold  a  pack  upon  a  pack-saddle 
against  a  gale  out  of  the  freezing  north  is  no 
high  industry,  but  it  is  one  that  serves  to 
occupy  and  compose  the  mind.  And  when 
the  present  is  so  exacting  who  can  annoy 
himself  about  the  future  ? 


A  SONG   OF  THE   ROAD 

'T^HE  gauger  walked  with  willing  foot, 
•*•       And  aye  the  gauger  played  the  flute  g 
And  what  should  Master  Gauger  play 
But  Over  the  hills  and  far  away  ? 

Whene'er  I  buckle  on  my  pack 
And  foot  it  gaily  in  the  track, 

0  pleasant  gauger,  long  since  dead, 

1  hear  you  fluting  on  ahead. 

You  go  with  me  the  selfsame  way— - 
'The  selfsame  air  for  me  you  play  ? 
For  I  do  think  and  so  do  you 
It  is  the  tune  to  travel  to. 
S 


For  who  would  gravely  set  his  face 
To  go  to  this  or  t'  other  place  ? 
There 's  nothing  under  Heav'n  so  blu» 
That 's  fairly  worth  the  travelling  to. 

On  every  hand  the  roads  begin, 
And  people  walk  with  zeal  therein; 
But  wheresoe'er  the  highways  tend, 
Be  sure  there 's  nothing  at  the  end. 

Then  follow  you,  wherever  hie 
The  travelling  mountains  of  the  sky. 
Or  let  the  streams  in  civil  mode 
Direct  your  choice  upon  a  road ; 

For  one  and  all,  or  high  or  low, 
Will  lead  you  where  you  wish  to  go; 
And  one  and  all  go  night  and  day 
Over  the  hills  and  far  away  I 


A  WALKING  tour  should  be  gone  upon 
•^~*-  alone,  because  freedom  is  of  the  essence ; 
because  you  should  be  able  to  stop  and  go  on, 
and  follow  this  way  or  that,  as  the  freak  takes 
you ;  and  because  you  must  have  your  own 
pace,  and  neither  trot  alongside  a  champion 
walker,  nor  mince  in  time  with  a  girl.  And 
then  you  must  be  open  to  all  impressions  and 
let  your  thoughts  take  colour  from  what  you 
see.  You  should  be  as  a  pipe  for  any  wind  tQ 
play  upon. 

9 


T  T  must  not  be  imagined  that  a  walking  tour, 
•*•  as  some  would  hare  us  fancy,  is  merely  a 
better  or  worse  way  of  seeing  the  country. 
There  are  many  ways  of  seeing  landscape 
quite  as  good ;  and  none  more  vivid,  in  spite 
of  canting  dilettantes,  than  from  a  railway 
train.  But  landscape  on  a  walking  tour  is 
quite  accessory.  He  who  is  indeed  of  the 
brotherhood  does  not  voyage  in  quest  of  the 
picturesque,  but  of  certain  jolly  humours — of 
the  hope  and  spirit  with  which  the  march 
begins  at  morning,  and  the  peace  and  spiritual 
repletion  of  the  evening's  rest.  He  cannot 
tell  whether  he  puts  his  knapsack  on,  or  takes 
it  off,  with  more  delight.  The  excitement  of 
the  departure  puts  him  in  key  for  that  of  the 
arrival.  Whatever  he  does  is  not  only  a  re- 
ward in  itself,  but  will  be  further  rewarded 
in  the  sequel ;  and  so  pleasure  leads  on  to 
pleasure  in  an  endless  chain. 

"^T  OR  does  the  scenery  any  more  affect  the 
•^  thoughts  than  the  thoughts  affect  the 
scenery.  We  see  places  through  our  humours 
as  through  differently-coloured  glasses.  We 
are  ourselves  a  term  in  the  equation,,  a  note 
of  the  chord,  and  make  discord  or  harmony 
almost  at  will.  There  is  no  fear  for  the  result, 
if  we  can  but  surrender  ourselves  sufficiently 
to  the  country  that  surrounds  and  follows  us, 
so  that  we  are  ever  thinking  suitable  thoughts 
or  telling  ourselves  some  suitable  sort  of  story 
jo 


as  we  go.  We  become  thus,  in  some  sense, 
a  centre  of  beauty ;  we  are  provocative  of 
beauty,  much  as  a  gentle  and  sincere  character 
is  provocative  of  sincerity  and  gentleness  in 
others. 

'"THERE  is  nobody  under  thirty  so  dead  but 
•*•  his  heart  will  stir  a  little  at  sight  of  a 
gypsies'  camp.  'We  are  not  cotton-spinners 
all;'  or,  at  least,  not  all  through.  There  is 
some  life  in  humanity  yet ;  and  youth  will 
now  and  again  find  a  brave  word,  to  say  in 
dispraise  of  riches,  and  throw  up  a  situation 
to  go  strolling  with  a  knapsack. 

T  BEGAN  my  little  pilgrimage  in  the  most 
•*•  enviable  of  all  humours :  that  in  which 
a  person,  with  a  sufficiency  of  money  and  a 
knapsack,  turns  his  back  on  a  town  and  walks 
forward  into  a  country  of  which  he  knows 
only  by  the  vague  report  of  others.  Such  an 
one  has  not  surrendered  his  will  and  con- 
tracted for  the  next  hundred  miles,  like  a  man 
on  a  railway.  He  may  change  his  mind  at 
every  finger-post,  and,  where  ways  meet, 
follow  vague  preferences  freely  and  go  the  low 
road  or  the  high,  choose  the  shadow  or  the 
sunshine,  suffer  himself  to  be  tempted  by  the 
lane  that  turns  immediately  into  the  woods, 
or  the  broad  road  that  lies  open  before  him 
into  the  distance,  and  shows  him  the  far-off 
spires  of  some  city,  or  a  range  of  mountain- 
II 


tops,  or  a  run  of  sea,  perhaps,  along  a  low 
horizon.  In  short,  he  may  gratify  his  every 
whim  and  fancy,  without  a  pang  of  reposing 
conscience,  or  the  least  jostle  of  his  self-respect. 
It  is  true,  however,  that  most  men  do  not 
possess  the  faculty  of  free  action,  the  priceless 
gift  of  being  able  to  live  for  the  moment  only; 
and  as  they  begin  to  go  forward  on  their 
journey,  they  will  find  that  they  have  made 
for  themselves  new  fetters.  Slight  projects 
they  may  have  entertained  for  a  moment,  half 
in  jest,  become  iron  laws  to  them,  they  know 
not  why.  They  will  be  led  by  the  nose  by 
these  vague  reports  of  which  I  spoke  above ; 
and  the  mere  fact  that  their  informant  men- 
tioned one  village  and  not  another  will  compel 
their  footsteps  with  inexplicable  power.  And 
yet  a  little  while,  yet  a  few  days  of  this 
fictitious  liberty,  and  they  will  begin  to  hear 
imperious  voices  calling  on  them  to  return ; 
and  some  passion,  some  duty,  some  worthy  or 
unworthy  expectation,  will  set  its  hand  upon 
their  shoulder  and  lead  them  back  into  the 
old  paths.  Once  and  again  we  have  all  made 
the  experiment.  We  know  the  end  of  it  right 
well.  And  yet  if  we  make  it  for  the  hundredth 
time  to-morrow,  it  will  have  the  same  charm 
as  ever ;  our  hearts  will  beat  and  our  eyes  will 
be  bright,  as  we  leave  the  town  behind  us, 
and  we  shall  feel  once  again  (as  we  have  felt 
so  often  before)  that  we  are  cutting  ourselves 
loose  for  ever  from  our  whole  past  life,  with 


all  its  sins  and  follies  and  circumscriptions, 
and  go  forward  as  a  new  creature  into  a  new 
world. 

IT  EREIN,  I  think,  lies  the  chief  attraction 
*•  •*•  of  railway  travel.  The  speed  is  so 
easy,  and  the  train  disturbs  so  little  the  scenes 
through  which  it  takes  us,  that  our  heart 
becomes  full  of  the  placidity  and  stillness  of 
the  country ;  and  while  the  body  is  borne 
forward  in  the  flying  chain  of  carriages,  the 
thoughts  alight,  as  the  humour  moves  them,  at 
unfrequented  stations ;  they  make  haste  up 
the  poplar  alley  that  leads  towards  town ; 
they  are  left  behind  with  the  signalman  as, 
shading  his  eyes  with  his  hand,  he  watches 
the  long  train  sweep  away  into  the  golden 
distance. 

"^T  OW,  there  is  no  time  when  business 
•^  habits  are  more  mitigated  than  on  a 
walking  tour.  And  so  during  these  halts,  as 
I  say,  you  will  feel  almost  free. 

...  If  the  evening  be  fine  and  warm, 
there  is  nothing  better  in  life  than  to  lounge 
before  the  inn  door  in  the  sunset,  or  lean  over 
the  parapet  of  the  bridge,  to  watch  the  weeds 
and  the  quick  fishes.  It  is  then,  if  ever,  that 
you  taste  joviality  to  the  full  significance  of 
that  audacious  word.  Your  muscles  are  so 
agreeably  slack,  you  feel  so  clean  and  so 
strong  and  so  idle,  that  whether  you  move  or 
13 


sit  still,  whatever  you  do  is  done  with  pride 
and  a  kingly  sort  of  pleasure.  You  fall  in 
talk  with  any  one,  wise  or  foolish,  drunk  or 
sober.  And  it  seems  as  if  a  hot  walk  purged 
you,  more  than  of  anything  else,  of  all  narrow- 
ness and  pride,  and  left  curiosity  to  play  its 
part  freely,  as  in  a  child  or  a  man  of  science. 
You  lay  aside  all  your  own  hobbies  to.  watch 
provincial  humours  develop  themselves  beiore 
you,  now  as  a^  laughable  farce,  and  now  grave 
and  beautiful  like  an  old  tale. 

T  T  is  almost  as  if  the  millennium  were 
•*•  arrived,  when  we  shall  throw  our  clocks 
and  watches  over  the  housetops,  and  remember 
time  and  seasons  no  more.  Not  to  keep  hours 
for  a  lifetime  is,  I  was  going  to  say,  to  live  for 
ever.  You  have  no  idea,  unless  you  have 
tried  it,  how  endlessly  long  is  a  summer's  day 
that  you  measure  out  only  by  hunger,  and 
bring  to  an  end  only  when  you  are  drowsy. 

T  KNOW  a  village  where  there  are  hardly 
•*•  any  clocks,  where  no  one  knows  more 
of  the  days  of  the  week  than  by  a  sort  of 
instinct  for  the  fete  on  Sundays,  and  where 
only  one  person  can  tell  you  the  day  of  the 
month,  and  she  is  generally  wrong ;  and  if 
people  were  aware  how  slow  Time  journeyed 
in  that  village,  and  what  armfuls  of  spare 
hours  he  gives,  over  and  above  the  bargain, 
to  its  wise  inhabitants,  I  believe  there  would 
14 


be  a  stampede  out  of  London,  Liverpool, 
Paris,  and  a  variety  of  large  towns,  where  the 
clocks  lose  their  heads,  and  shake  the  hours 
out  each  one  faster  than  the  other,  as  though 
they  were  all  in  a  wager.  And  all  these 
foolish  pilgrims  would  each  bring  his  own 
misery  along  with  him,  in  a  watch-pocket  1 

/1PHE  bed  was  made,  the  room  was  fit, 
•*•      By  punctual  eve  the  stars  were  lit ; 

The  air  was  still,  the  water  ran ; 
No  need  there  was  for  maid  or  man, 
When  we  put  up,  my  ass  and  I, 

At  God's  green  caravanserai. 

/HPO  wash  in  one  of  God's  rivers  in  the  open 
•*•  air  seems  to  me  a  sort  of  cheerful 
solemnity  or  semi-pagan  act  of  worship.  To 
dabble  among  dishes  in  a  bedroom  may 
perhaps  make  clean  the  body ;  but  the  im- 
agination takes  no  share  in  such  a  cleansing. 

T  OWN  I  like  definite  form  in  what  my  eyes 
•*•  are  to  rest  upon  ;  and  if  landscapes  were 
sold,  like  the  sheets  of  characters  of  my  boy- 
hood, one  penny  plain  and  twopence  coloured, 
I  should  go  the  length  of  twopence  every  day 
of  my  life. 

^HERE  should  be  some  myth  (but  if  there 
is,     I  know    it   not)    founded    on   the 
shivering  of  the  reeds.     There  are  not  many 
IS 


things  in  nature  more  striking  to  man's  eye. 
It  is  such  an  eloquent  pantomime  of  terror ; 
and  to  see  such  a  number  of  terrified  creatures 
taking  sanctuary  in  every  nook  along  the  shore 
is  enough  to  infect  a  silly  human  with  alarm. 
Perhaps  they  are  only  a-cold,  and  no  wonder, 
standing  waist  deep  in  the  stream.  Or, 
perhaps,  they  have  never  got  accustomed  to 
the  speed  and  fury  of  the  river's  flux,  or  the 
miracle  of  its  continuous  body.  Pan  once 
played  upon  their  forefathers ;  and  so,  by  the 
hands  of  his  river,  he  still  plays  upon  these 
later  generations  down  all  the  valley  of  the 
Oise ;  and  plays  the  same  air,  both  sweet  and 
shrill,  to  tell  us  of  the  beauty  and  the  terror 
of  the  world. 

The  reeds  might  nod  their  heads  in  warning, 
and  with  tremulous  gestures  tell  how  the  river 
was  as  cruel  as  it  was  strong  and  cold,  and 
how  death  lurked  in  the  eddy  underneath  the 
willows.  But  the  reeds  had  to  stand  where 
they  were;  and  those  who  stand  still  are 
always  timid  advisers. 


/T*  HE  whole  day  was  showery,  with  occasional 

•*•       drenching  plumps.     We  were  soaked  to 

the  skin,  then  partially  dried  in  the  sun,  then 

soaked  once  more.    But  there  were  some  calm 

intervals,  and  one    notably,  when    we   were 

skirting  the  forest  of  Mormal,  a  sinister  name 

to  the  ear,  but  a  place  most  gratifying  to  sight 

16 


and  smell.  It  looked  solemn  along  the  river- 
side, drooping  its  boughs  into  the  water,  and 
piling  them  up  aloft  into  a  wall  of  leaves. 
What  is  a  forest  but  a  city  of  nature's  own, 
full  of  hardy  and  innocuous  living  things, 
where  there  is  nothing  dead  and  nothing  made 
with  the  hands,  but  the  citizens  themselves  are 
the  houses  and  public  monuments  ?  There  is 
nothing  so  much  alive  and  yet  so  quiet  as  a 
woodland ;  and  a  pair  of  people,  swinging 
past  in  canoes,  feel  very  small  and  bustling  by 
comparison. 

I  wish  our  way  had  always  lain  among 
woods.  Trees  are  the  most  civil  society.  An 
old  oak  that  has  been  growing  where  he 
stands  since  before  the  Reformation,  taller 
than  many  spires,  more  stately  than  the 
greater  part  of  mountains,  and  yet  a  living 
thing,  liable  to  sicknesses  and  death,  like  you 
and  me  :  is  not  that  in  itself  a  speaking  lesson 
in  history  ?  But  acres  on  acres  full  of  such 
patriarchs  contiguously  rooted,  their  green 
tops  billowing  in  the  wind,  their  stalwart 
younglings  pushing  up  about  their  knees ;  a 
whole  forest,  healthy  and  beautiful,  giving 
colour  to  the  light,  giving  perfume  to  the  air  ; 
what  is  this  but  the  most  imposing  piece  in 
nature's  repertory  ? 

T)  UT  indeed  it  is  not  so  much  for  its  beauty 
•*-'     that  the  forest  makes  a  claim  upon  men's 
hearts,   as    for    that    subtle    something,   that 
B  17 


quality  of  the  air,  that  emanation  from  the 
old  trees,  that  so  wonderfully  changes  and 
renews  a  weary  spirit. 


all  this  in  mind,  I  have  often  been 
tempted  to  put  forth  the  paradox  that 
any  place  is  good  enough  to  live  a  life  in, 
while  it  is  only  in  a  few,  and  those  highly 
favoured,  that  we  can  pass  a  few  hours  agree- 
ably. For,  if  we  only  stay  long  enough,  we 
become  at  home  in  the  neighbourhood.  Re- 
miniscences spring  up,  like  flowers,  about 
uninteresting  corners.  We  forget  to  some 
degree  the  superior  loveliness  of  other  places, 
and  fall  into  a  tolerant  and  sympathetic  spirit 
which  is  its  own  reward  and  justification. 

"T^OR  when  we  are  put  down  in  some  un- 
•*•  sightly  neighbourhood,  and  especially 
if  we  have  come  to  be  more  or  less  dependent 
on  what  we  see,  we  must  set  ourselves  to  hunt 
out  beautiful  things  with  all  the  ardour  and 
patience  of  a  botanist  after  a  rare  plant.  Day 
by  day  we  perfect  ourselves  in  the  art  of  seeing 
nature  more  favourably.  We  learn  to  live 
with  her,  as  people  learn  to  live  with  fretful 
or  violent  spouses  :  we  dwell  lovingly  on  what 
is  good,  and  shut  our  eyes  against  all  that  is 
bleak  or  inharmonious.  We  learn,  also,  to 
come  to  each  place  in  the  right  spirit.  The 
traveller,  as  Brantome  quaintly  tells  us,  *  fait 
des  discours  en  soi  pour  se  soutenir  en  chemin.' 
18 


'"THERE  is  no  end,  indeed,  to  making 
•*•  books  or  experiments,  or  to  travel, 
or  to  gathering  wealth.  Problem  gives  rise 
to  problem.  We  may  study  for  ever,  and 
we  are  never  as  learned  as  we  would. 
We  have  never  made  a  statue  worthy  of 
our  dreams.  And  when  we  have  discovered 
a  continent,  or  crossed  a  chain  of  mountains, 
it  is  only  to  find  another  ocean  or  another 
plain  upon  the  farther  side.  In  the  infinite 
universe  there  is  room  for  our  swiftest  diligence 
and  to  spare.  It  is  not  like  the  works  of 
Carlyle,  which  can  be  read  to  an  end.  Even 
in  a  corner  of  it,  in  a  private  park,  or  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  a  single  hamlet,  the  weather 
and  the  seasons  keep  so  deftly  changing  that 
although  we  walk  there  for  a  lifetime  there  will 
be  always  something  to  startle  and  delight  us. 

T  T  is  in  virtue  of  his  own  desires  and 
•*•  curiosities  that  any  man  continues  to 
exist  with  even  patience,  that  he  is  charmed 
by  the  look  of  things  and  people,  and  that 
he  wakens  every  morning  with  a  renewed 
appetite  for  work  and  pleasure.  Desire  and 
curiosity  are  the  two  eyes  through  which  he 
sees  the  world  in  the  most  enchanted  colours : 
it  is  they  that  make  women  beautiful  or  fossils 
interesting :  and  the  man  may  squander  his 
estate  and  come  to  beggary,  but  if  he  keeps 
these  two  amulets  he  is  still  rich  in  the 
possibilities  of  pleasure. 
19 


"PO  look  on  the  happy  side  of  nature  is 
common,  in  their  hours,  to  all  created 
things.  Some  are  vocal  under  a  good  in- 
fluence, are  pleasing  whenever  they  are 
pleased,  and  hand  on  their  happiness  to 
others,  as  a  child  who,  looking  upon  lovely 
things,  looks  lovely.  Some  leap  to  the  strains 
with  unapt  foot,  and  make  a  halting  figure  in 
the  universal  dance.  And  some,  like  sour 
spectators  at  the  play,  receive  the  music  into 
their  hearts  with  an  unmoved  countenance, 
and  walk  like  strangers  through  the  general 
rejoicing.  But  let  him  feign  never  so  care- 
fully, there  is  not  a  man  but  has  his  pulses 
shaken  when  Pan  trolls  out  a  stave  of  ecstasy 
and  sets  the  world  a-singing. 


C  CIENCE  writes  of  the  world  as  if  with  the 
**^  cold  finger  of  a  starfish  ;  it  is  all  true  ; 
but  what  is  it  when  compared  to  the  reality  of 
which  it  discourses  ?  where  hearts  beat  high  in 
April,  and  death  strikes,  and  hills  totter  in  the 
earthquake,  and  there  is  a  glamour  over  all  the 
objects  of  sight,  and  a  thrill  in  all  noises  for 
the  ear,  and  Romance  herself  has  made  her 
dwelling  among  men?  So  we  come  back  to 
the  old  myth,  and  hear  the  goat-footed  piper 
making  the  music  which  is  itself  the  charm 
and  terror  of  things  ;  and  when  a  glen  invites 
our  visiting  footsteps,  fancy  that  Pan  leads  us 
thither  with  a  gracious  tremolo ;  or  when  our 
20 


hearts  quail  at  the  thunder  of  the  cataract,  tell 
ourselves  that  he  has  stamped  his  hoof  in  the 
nigh  thicket. 

*~PHE  Greeks  figured  Pan,  the  god  of 
•*•  Nature,  now  terribly  stamping  his  foot, 
so  that  armies  were  dispersed ;  now  by  the 
woodside  on  a  summer  noon  trolling  on  his 
pipe  until  he  charmed  the  hearts  of  upland 
ploughmen.  And  the  Greeks,  in  so  figuring, 
uttered  the  last  word  of  human  experience. 
To  certain  smoke-dried  spirits  matter  and 
motion  and  elastic  ethers,  and  the  hypothesis 
of  this  or  that  other  spectacled  professor,  tell 
a  speaking  story  ;  but  for  youth  and  all  ductile 
and  congenial  minds,  Pan  is  not  dead,  but  of 
all  the  classic  hierarchy  alone  survives  in 
triumph  ;  goat-footed,  with  a  gleeful  and  an 
angry  look,  the  type  of  the  shaggy  world  : 
and  in  every  wood,  if  you  go  with  a  spirit 
properly  prepared,  you  shall  hear  the  note  of 
his  pipe. 

npO  leave  home  in  early  life  is  to  be  stunned 
•*•  and  quickened  with  novelties  ;  but  when 
years  have  come,  it  only  casts  a  more  endearing 
light  upon  the  past.  As  in  those  composite 
photographs  of  Mr.  Galton's,  the  image  of 
each  new  sitter  brings  out  but  the  more  clearly 
the  central  features  of  the  race  ;  when  once 
youth  has  flown,  each  new  impression  only 
deepens  the  sense  of  nationality  and  the  desire 
21 


of  native  places.  So  may  some  cadet  of  Royal 
Ecossais  or  the  Albany  Regiment,  as  he 
mounted  guard  about  French  citadels,  so  may 
some  officer  marching  his  company  of  the 
Scots-Dutch  among  the  polders,  have  felt  the 
soft  rains  of  the  Hebrides  upon  his  brow,  or 
started  in  the  ranks  at  the  remembered  aroma 
of  peat-smoke.  And  the  rivers  of  home  are 
dear  in  particular  to  all  men.  This  is  as  old 
as  Naaman,  who  was  jealous  for  Abana  and 
Pharpar  ;  it  is  confined  to  no  race  nor  country, 
for  I  know  one  of  Scottish  blood  but  a  child  of 
Suffolk,  whose  fancy  still  lingers  about  the 
lilied  lowland  waters  of  that  shire. 


THE  COUNTRY  OF  THE 
CAMISARDS 

"\  \  7E  travelled  in  the  print  of  olden  wars ; 
*  *         Yet  all  the  land  was  green  ; 

And  love  we  found,  and  peace, 
Where  fire  and  war  had  been. 

They  pass  and  smile,  the  children  of  the  sword — 
No  more  the  sword  they  wield  j 
And  O,  how  deep  the  corn 
Along  the  battlefield ! 

n^O  reckon  dangers  too  curiously,  to  hearken 

•*•       too   intently   for   the   threat  that    runs 

through  all  the  winning  music  of  the  world,  to 

bold  back  the  hand  from  the  rose  because  of 

22 


the  thorn,  and  from  life  because  of  death  :  this 
it  is  to  be  afraid  of  Pan.  Highly  respectable 
citizens  who  flee  life's  pleasures  and  responsi- 
bilities and  keep,  with  upright  hat,  upon  the 
midway  of  custom,  avoiding  the  right  hand  and 
the  left,  the  ecstasies  and  the  agonies,  how  sur- 
prised they  would  be  if  they  could  hear  their 
attitude  mythologically  expressed,  and  knew 
themselves  as  tooth-chattering  ones,  who  flee 
from  Nature  because  they  fear  the  hand  of 
Nature's  God  ! 

H^HE  spice  of  life  is  battle;  the  friendliest 
•*•  relations  are  still  a  kind  of  contest ;  and 
if  we  would  not  forego  all  that  is  valuable  in 
our  lot,  we  must  continually  face  some  other 
person,  eye  to  eye,  and  wrestle  a  fall  whether 
in  love  or  enmity.  It  is  still  by  force  of  body, 
or  power  of  character  or  intellect,  that  we  attain 
to  worthy  pleasures. 

T7XTREME  busyness,  whether  at  school  or 
^"^  college,  kirk  or  market,  is  a  symptom  of 
deficient  vitality  ;  and  a  faculty  for  idleness 
implies  a  catholic  appetite  and  a  strong  sense 
of  personal  identity.  There  is  a  sort  of  dead- 
alive,  hackneyed  people  about,  who  are  scarcely 
conscious  of  living  except  in  the  exercise  of 
some  conventional  occupation.  Bring  these 
fellows  into  the  country,  or  set  them  aboard 
ship,  and  you  will  see  how  they  pine  for  their  '• 
desk  or  their  study.  They  have  no  curiosity  ; 
23 


they  cannot  give  themselves  over  to  random 
provocations  ;  they  do  not  take  pleasure  in  the 
exercise  of  their  faculties  for  its  own  sake  ;  and 
unless  Necessity  lays  about  them  with  a  stick, 
they  will  even  stand  still.  It  is  no  good 
speaking  to  such  folk  :  they  cannot  be  idle, 
their  nature  is  not  generous  enough  ;  and  they 
pass  those  hours  in  a  sort  of  coma,  which  are 
not  dedicated  to  furious  moiling  in  the  gold- 
mill. 

T  F  a  person  cannot  be  happy  without 
•^  remaining  idle,  idle  he  should  remain. 
It  is  a  revolutionary  precept ;  but  thanks  to 
hunger  and  the  workhouse,  one  not  easily  to 
be  abused  ;  and  within  practical  limits,  it  is 
one  of  the  most  incontestable  truths  in  the 
whole  Body  of  Morality.  Look  at  one  of  your 
industrious  fellows  for  a  moment,  I  beseech 
you.  He  sows  hurry  and  reaps  indigestion  ; 
he  puts  a  vast  deal  of  activity  out  to  interest, 
and  receives  a  large  measure  of  nervous 
derangement  in  return.  Either  he  absents 
himself  entirely  from  all  fellowship,  and  lives 
a  recluse  in  a  garret,  with  carpet  slippers  and 
a  leaden  inkpot ;  or  he  comes  among  people 
swiftly  and  bitterly,  in  a  contraction  of  his 
whole  nervous  system,  to  discharge  some 
temper  before  he  returns  to  work.  I  do  not 
care  how  much  or  how  well  he  works,  this 
fellow  is  an  evil  feature  in  other  people's  lives- 
They  would  be  happier  if  he  were  dead. 
24 


'  VXTE  are  all  employed  in  commerce  during 
the  day ;   but  in  the  evening,  voyez- 
vous,  nous  sommes  strieuxS 

These  were  the  words.  They  were  an  em- 
ployed over  the  frivolous  mercantile  concerns 
of  Belgium  during  the  day  ;  but  in  the  evening 
they  found  some  hours  for  the  serious  concerns 
of  life.  I  may  have  a  wrong  idea  of  wisdom, 
but  I  think  that  was  a  very  wise  remark. 
People  connected  with  literature  and  philo- 
sophy are  busy  all  their  days  in  getting  rid  of 
second-hand  notions  and  false  standards.  It 
is  their  profession,  in  the  sweat  of  their  brows, 
by  dogged  thinking,  to  recover  their  old  fresh 
view  of  life,  and  distinguish  what  they  really 
and  originally  like  from  what  they  have  only 
learned  to  tolerate  perforce.  And  these  Royal 
Nautical  Sportsmen  had  the  distinction  still 
quite  legible  in  their  hearts.  They  had  still 
those  clean  perceptions  of  what  is  nice  and 
nasty,  what  is  interesting  and  what  is  dull, 
which  envious  old  gentlemen  refer  to  as 
illusions.  The  nightmare  illusion  of  middle 
age,  the  bear's  hug  of  custom  gradually 
squeezing  the  life  out  of  a  man's  soul,  had  not 
yet  begun  for  these  happy-starr'd  young 
Belgians.  They  still  knew  that  the  interest 
they  took  in  their  business  was  a  trifling  affair 
compared  to  their  spontaneous,  long-suffering 
affection  for  nautical  sports.  To  know  what 
you  prefer,  instead  of  humbly  saying  Amen  to 
what  the  world  tells  you  you  ought  to  prefer,  is 
25 


to  have  kept  your  soul  alive.  Such  a  man  may 
be  generous ;  he  may  be  honest  in  something 
more  than  the  commercial  sense  ;  he  may  love 
his  friends  with  an  elective,  personal  sympathy, 
and  not  accept  them  as  an  adjunct  of  the  station 
to  which  he  has  been  called.  He  may  be  a 
man,  in  short,  acting  on  his  own  instincts, 
keeping  in  his  own  shape  that  God  made  him 
in ;  and  not  a  mere  crank  in  the  social  engine- 
house,  welded  on  principles  that  he  does  not 
understand,  and  for  purposes  that  he  does  not 
care  for. 


T  SUPPOSE  none  of  us  recognise  the  great 
•*•  part  that  is  played  in  life  by  eating 
and  drinking.  The  appetite  is  so  imperious 
that  we  can  stomach  the  least  interesting 
viands,  and  pass  off  a  dinner  hour  thankfully 
enough  on  bread  and  water ;  just  as  there  are 
men  who  must  read  something,  if  it  were  only 
'  Bradshaw's  Guide.'  But  there  is  a  romance 
about  the  matter,  after  all.  Probably  the  table 
has  more  devotees  than  love ;  and  I  am  sure 
that  food  is  much  more  generally  entertaining 
than  scenery.  Do  you  give  in,  as  Walt  Whit- 
man would  say,  that  you  are  any  the  less  im- 
mortal for  that  ?  f'The  true  materialism  is  to  be 
ashamed  of  what  we  are.  To  detect  the  flavour 
of  an  olive  is  no  less  a  piece  of  human  per- 
fection than  to  find  beauty  in  the  colours  of  the 
sunset. 

26 


T^OR  the  country  people  to  see  Edinburgh 
•*•  on  her  hill-tops,  is  one  thing ;  it  is 
another  for  the  citizen,  from  the  thick  of  his 
affairs,  to  overlook  the  country.  It  should  be 
a  genial  and  ameliorating  influence  in  life ;  it 
should  prompt  good  thoughts  and  remind  him 
of  Nature's  unconcern  :  that  he  can  watch  from 
day  to  day,  as  he  trots  officeward,  how  the 
spring  green  brightens  in  the  wood,  or  the 
field  grows  black  under  a  moving  ploughshare. 
I  have  been  tempted,  in  this  connection,  to 
deplore  the  slender  faculties  of  the  human 
race,  with  its  penny-whistle  of  a  voice,  its  dull 
ears,  and  its  narrow  range  of  sight.  If  you 
could  see  as  people  are  to  see  in  heaven,  if  you 
had  eyes  such  as  you  can  fancy  for  a  superior 
race,  if  you  could  take  clear  note  of  the  objects 
of  vision,  not  only  a  few  yards,  but  a  few  miles 
from  where  you  stand  : — think  how  agreeably 
your  sight  would  be  entertained,  how  pleasantly 
your  thoughts  would  be  diversified,  as  you  walk 
the  Edinburgh  streets  !  For  you  might  pause, 
in  some  business  perplexity,  in  the  midst  of  the 
city  traffic,  and  perhaps  catch  the  eye  of  a 
shepherd  as  he  sat  down  to  breathe  upon  a 
heathery  shoulder  of  the  Pentlands  ;  or  perhaps 
some  urchin,  clambering  in  a  country  elm, 
would  put  aside  the  leaves  and  show  you  his 
flushed  and  rustic  visage  ;  or  as  a  fisher  racing 
seaward,  with  the  tiller  under  his  elbow,  and 
the  sail  sounding  in  the  wind,  would  fling  you 
a  salutation  from  between  Anst'er  and  the  May. 


OO  you  sit,  like  Jupiter  on  Olympus,  and 
*-'  look  down  from  afar  upon  men's  life. 
The  city  is  as  silent  as  a  city  of  the  dead: 
from  all  its  humming  thoroughfares,  not  a 
voice,  not  a  footfall,  reaches  you  upon  the 
hill.  The  sea-surf,  the  cries  of  plough- 
men, the  streams  and  the  mill-wheels,  the 
birds  and  the  wind,  keep  up  an  animated 
concert  through  the  plain  ;  from  farm  to  farm, 
dogs  and  crowing  cocks  contend  together  in 
defiance  ;  and  yet  from  this  Olympian  station, 
except  for  the  whispering  rumour  of  a  train, 
the  world  has  fallen  into  a  dead  silence,  and  the 
business  of  town  and  country  grown  voiceless 
in  your  ears.  A  crying  hill-bird,  the  bleat  of 
a  sheep,  a  wind  singing  in  the  dry  grass,  seem 
not  so  much  to  interrupt,  as  to  accompany,  the 
stillness ;  but  to  the  spiritual  ear,  the  whole 
scene  makes  a  music  at  once  human  and  rural, 
and  discourses  pleasant  reflections  on  the 
destiny  of  man.  The  spiry  habitable  city, 
ships,  the  divided  fields,  and  browsing  herds, 
and  the  straight  highways,  tell  visibly  of  man's 
active  and  comfortable  ways ;  and  you  may 
be  never  so  laggard  and  never  so  unimpression- 
able, but  there  is  something  in  the  view  that 
spirits  up  your  blood  and  puts  you  in  the  vein 
for  cheerful  labour. 

npHE  night,  though  we  were  so  little  past 

•*•       midsummer,   was  as  dark   as  January. 

Intervals  of  a  groping  twilight  alternated  with 

28 


spells  or' utter  blackness  ;  and  it  was  impossible 
to  trace  the  reason  of  these  changes  in  the 
flying  horror  of  the  sky.  The  wind  blew  the 
breath  out  of  a  man's  nostrils ;  all  heaven 
seemed  to  thunder  overhead  like  one  huge  sail ; 
and  when  there  fell  a  momentary  lull  on  Arcs, 
we  could  hear  the  gusts  dismally  sweeping  in 
the  distance.  Over  all  the  lowlands  of  the  Ross 
the  wind  must  have  blown  as  fierce  as  on  the 
open  sea  ;  and  God  only  knows  the  uproar  that 
was  raging  around  the  head  of  Ben  Kyaw. 
Sheets  of  mingled  spray  and  rain  were  driven 
in  our  faces.  All  round  the  isle  of  Arcs,  the 
surf,  with  an  incessant,  hammering  thunder, 
beat  upon  the  reefs  and  beaches.  Now  louder 
in  one  place,  now  lower  in  another,  like  the 
combinations  of  orchestral  music,  the  constant 
mass  of  sound  was  hardly  varied  for  a  moment. 
And  loud  above  all  this  hurly-burly  I  could  hear 
the  changeful  voices  of  the  Roost  and  the 
intermittent  roaring  of  the  Merry  Men.  At 
that  hour  there  flashed  into  my  mind  the  reason 
of  the  name  that  they  were  called.  For  the 
noise  of  them  seemed  almost  mirthful,  as  it 
out-topped  the  other  noises  of  the  night ;  or  if 
not  mirthful,  yet  instinct  with  a  portentous 
joviality.  Nay,  and  it  seemed  even  human. 
As  when  savage  men  have  drunk  away  their 
reason,  and,  discarding  speech  bawl  together 
in  their  madness  by  the  hour  ;  so,  to  my  ears, 
these  deadly  breakers  shouted  by  Aros  in  the 
night. 


T  WAS  walking  one  night  in  the  verandah 
•^  of  a  small  house  in  which  I  lived,  outside 
the  hamlet  of  Saranac.  It  was  winter ;  the 
night  was  very  dark  ;  the  air  extraordinary 
clear  and  cold,  and  sweet  with  the  purity  of 
forests.  From  a  good  way  below,  the  river 
was  to  be  heard  contending  with  ice  and 
boulders ;  a  few  lights,  scattered  unevenly 
among  the  darkness,  but  so  far  away  as  not  to 
lessen  the  sense  of  isolation.  For  the  making 
of  a  story  here  were  fine  conditions. 

f\  N  all  this  part  of  the  coast,  and  especially 
^-^  near  Aros,  these  great  granite  rocks 
that  I  have  spoken  of  go  down  together  in 
troops  into  the  sea,  like  cattle  on  a  summer's 
day.  There  they  stand,  for  all  the  world  like 
their  neighbours  ashore ;  only  the  salt  water 
sobbing  between  them  instead  of  the  quiet 
earth,  and  clots  of  sea-pink  blooming  on  their 
sides  instead  of  heather ;  and  the  great  sea- 
conger  to  wreathe  about  the  base  of  them 
instead  of  the  poisonous  viper  of  the  land.  On 
calm  days  you  can  go  wandering  between  them 
in  a  boat  for  hours,  echoes  following  you  about 
the  labyrinth  ;  but  when  the  sea  is  up,  Heaven 
help  the  man  that  hears  that  caldron  boiling. 

T  T  had  snowed  overnight.  The  fields  were 
•*•  all  sheeted  up;  they  were  tucked  in 
among  the  snow,  and  their  shape  was  modelled 
through  the  pliant  counterpane,  like  children 
3° 


tucked  in  by  a  fond  mother.  The  wind  had 
made  ripples  and  folds  upon  the  surface,  like 
what  the  sea,  in  quiet  weather,  leaves  upon  the 
sand.  There  was  a  frosty  stifle  in  the  air. 
An  effusion  of  coppery  light  on  the  summit  of 
Brown  Carrick  showed  where  the  sun  was 
trying  to  look  through  ;  but  along  the  horizon 
clouds  of  cold  fog  had  settled  down,  so  that 
there  was  no  distinction  of  sky  and  sea.  Over 
the  white  shoulders  of  the  headlands,  or  in  the 
opening  of  bays,  there  was  nothing  but  a  great 
vacancy  and  blackness  ;  and  the  road  as  it 
drew  near  the  edge  of  the  cliff,  seemed  to  skirt 
the  shores  of  creation  and  void  space. 


V/yHEN  we  are  looking  at  a  landscape  we 
'  think  ourselves  pleased;  but  it  is  only 
when  it  comes  back  upon  us  by  the  fire  o* 
nights  that  we  can  disentangle  the  main  charm 
from  the  thick  of  particulars.  It  is  just  so  with 
what  is  lately  past.  It  is  too  much  loaded 
with  detail  to  be  distinct  ;  and  the  canvas  is 
too  large  for  the  eye  to  encompass.  But  this 
is  no  more  the  case  when  our  recollections 
have  been  strained  long  enough  through  the 
hour-glass  of  time  ;  when  they  have  been  the 
burthen  of  so  much  thought,  the  charm  and 
comfort  of  so  many  a  vigil.  All  that  is  worth- 
less has  been  sieved  and  sifted  out  of  them. 
Nothing  remains  but  the  brightest  lights  an<$ 
the  darkest  shadows. 

31 


OURNS,  too  proud  and  honest  not  to  work, 
•*-*  continued  through  all  reverses  to  sing  of 
poverty  with  a  light,  defiant  note.  Beranger 
waited  till  he  was  himself  beyond  the  reach 
of  want  before  writing  the  Old  Vagabond  or 
Jacques.  Samuel  Johnson,  although  he  was 
very  sorry  to  be  poor,  '  was  a  great  arguer  for 
the  advantages  of  poverty '  in  his  ill  days. 
Thus  it  is  that  brave  men  carry  their  crosses, 
and  smile  with  the  fox  burrowing  in  their 
vitals. 

"M"OW,  what  I  like  so  much  in  France  is 
*•  ^  the  clear,  unflinching  recognition  by 
everybody  of  his  own  luck.  They  all  know 
on  which  side  their  bread  is  buttered,  and  take 
a  pleasure  in  showing  it  to  others,  which  is 
surely  the  better  part  of  religion.  And  they 
scorn  to  make  a  poor  mouth  over  their  poverty, 
which  I  take  to  be  the  better  part  of  manliness. 

T  F  people  knew  what  an  inspiriting  thing  it 
•••  is  to  hear  a  man  boasting,  so  long  as  he 
boasts  of  what  he  really  has,  I  believe  they 
would  do  it  more  freely  and  with  a  better  grace. 

A  GIRL  at  school  in  France  began  to 
^*-  describe  one  of  our  regiments  on  parade 
to  her  French  school-mates,  and  as  she  went 
on  she  told  me  the  recollection  grew  so  vivid, 
she  became  so  proud  to  be  the  countrywoman 
of  such  soldiers,  and  so  sorry  to  be  in  another 


country,  that  her  voice  failed  her  and  she  burst 
into  tears.  I  have  never  forgotten  that  girl, 
and  I  think  she  very  nearly  deserves  a  statue. 
To  call  her  a  young  lady,  with  all  its  niminy  as- 
sociations, would  be  to  offer  her  an  insult.  She 
may  rest  assured  of  one  thing,  although  she 
never  should  marry  a  heroic  general,  never  see 
any  great  or  immediate  result  of  her  life,  she 
will  not  have  lived  in  vain  for  her  native  land. 

AS  I  went,  I  was  thinking  of  Smethurst 
with  admiration;  a  look  into  that  man's 
mind  was  like  a  retrospect  over  the  smiling 
champaign  of  his  past  life,  and  very  different 
from  the  Sinai-gorges  up  which  one  looks  for 
a  terrified  moment  into  the  dark  souls  of  many 
good,  many  wise,  and  many  prudent  men.  I 
cannot  be  very  grateful  to  such  men  for  their 
excellence,  and  wisdom,  and  prudence.  I  find 
myself  facing  as  stoutly  as  I  can  a  hard,  com- 
bative existence,  full  of  doubt,  difficulties, 
defeats,  disappointments,  and  dangers,  quite  a 
hard  enough  life  without  their  dark  counte- 
nances at  my  elbow,  so  that  what  I  want  is  a 
happy-minded  Smethurst  placed  here  and  there 
at  ugly  corners  of  my  life's  wayside,  preaching 
his  gospel  of  quiet  and  contentment. 

THERE   is   a   certain   critic,  not   indeed   of 
execution  but  of  matter,  whom  I  dare  be 
known  to   set  before  the  best:    a  certain  low- 
browed, hairy  gentleman,  at  first  a  percher  in 
C  33 


the  fork  of  trees,  next  (as  they  relate)  a  dweller 
in  caves,  and  whom  I  think  I  see  squatting  in 
cave-mouths,  of  a  pleasant  afternoon,  to  munch 
his  berries  —  his  wife,  that  accomplished  lady, 
squatting  by  his  side  :  his  name  I  never  heard, 
but  he  is  often  described  as  Probably  Arboreal, 
which  may  serve  for  recognition.  Each  has 
his  own  tree  of  ancestors,  but  at  the  top  of  all 
sits  Probably  Arboreal  ;  in  all  our  veins  there 
run  some  minims  of  his  old,  wild,  tree-top 
blood  ;  our  civilised  nerves  still  tingle  with  his 
rude  terrors  and  pleasures  ;  and  to  that  which 
would  have  moved  our  common  ancestors,  all 
must  obediently  thrill. 


'T^HIS  is  an  age  when  genealogy  has  taken 
•*•  a  new  lease  of  life,  and  become  for  the 
first  time  a  human  science  ;  so  that  we  no  longer 
study  it  in  quest  of  the  Guaith  Voeths,  but  to 
trace  out  some  of  the  secrets  of  descent  and 
destiny  ;  and  as  we  study,  we  think  less  of  Sir 
Bernard  Burke  and  more  of  Mr.  Galton.  Not 
only  do  our  character  and  talents  lie  upon  the 
anvil  and  receive  their  temper  during  genera- 
tions ;  but  the  very  plot  of  our  life's  story  unfolds 
itself  on  a  scale  of  centuries,  and  the  biography 
of  the  man  is  only  an  episode  in  the  epic  of  the 
family. 

T)UT  our  ancestral  adventures  are  beyond 

•^•^     even  the  arithmetic  of  fancy  ;  and  it  is 

the  chief  recommendation  of  long  pedigrees, 

34 


that  we  can  follow  backward  the  careers  of  our 
homunculos  and  be  reminded  of  our  antenatal 
lives.  Our  conscious  years  are  but  a  moment 
in  the  history  of  the  elements  that  build  us. 

"\1THAT  is  mine,  then,  and  what  am  I  ?  If 
not  a  curve  in  this  poor  body  of  mine 
(which  you  love,  and  for  the  sake  of  which  you 
dotingly  dream  that  you  love  me),  not  a  gesture 
that  I  can  frame,  not  a  tone  of  my  voice,  not  a 
look  from  my  eyes,  no,  not  even  now  when 
I  speak  to  him  I  love,  but  has  belonged  to 
others?  Others,  ages  dead,  have  wooed  other 
men  with  my  eyes  ;  other  men  have  heard  the 
pleadings  of  the  same  voice  that  now  sounds  in 
your  ears.  The  hands  of  the  dead  are  in  my 
bosom ;  they  move  me,  they  pluck  me,  they 
guide  me ;  I  am  a  puppet  at  their  command ; 
and  I  but  re-inform  features  and  attributes  that 
have  long  been  laid  aside  from  evil  in  the  quiet 
of  the  grave.  Is  it  me  you  love,  friend  ?  or  the 
race  that  made  me?  The  girl  who  does  not 
know  and  cannot  answer  for  the  least  portion 
of  herself?  or  the  stream  of  which  she  is  a 
transitory  eddy,  the  tree  of  which  she  is  the 
passing  fruit  ?  The  race  exists  ;  it  is  old,  it  is 
ever  young,  it  carries  its  eternal  destiny  in  its 
bosom  ;  upon  it,  like  waves  upon  the  sea,  in- 
dividual succeeds  individual,  mocked  with  a 
semblance  of  self-control,  but  they  are  nothing. 
We  speak  of  the  soul,  but  the  soul  is  in  the 
race. 

35 


"THE  future  is  nothing ;  but  the  past  is  my- 
•*•  self,  my  own  history,  the  seed  of  my 
present  thoughts,  the  mould  of  my  present 
disposition.  It  is  not  in  vain  that  I  return  to 
the  nothings  of  my  childhood  ;  for  every  one  of 
them  has  left  some  stamp  upon  me  or  put 
some  fetter  on  my  boasted  free-will.  In  the 
past  is  my  present  fate  ;  and  m  the  past  also  is 
my  real  life. 

TJ*OR  as  tne  race  01  man,  after  centuries  of 
•^  civilisation,  still  keeps  some  traits  of 
their  barbarian  fathers,  so  man  the  individual 
is  not  altogether  quit  of  youth,  when  he  is 
already  old  and  honoured,  and  Lord  Chan- 
cellor of  England.  We  advance  in  years 
somewhat  in  the  manner  of  an  invading  army 
in  a  barren  land ;  the  age  that  we  have 
reached,  as  the  phrase  goes,  we  but  hold  with 
an  outpost,  and  still  keep  open  our  com- 
munications with  the  extreme  rear  and  first 
beginnings  of  the  march.  There  is  our  true 
base ;  that  is  not  only  the  beginning,  but  the 
perennial  spring  of  our  faculties ;  and  grand- 
father William  can  retire  upon  occasion  into 
the  green  enchanted  forest  of  his  boyhood. 

'T^HE  regret  we  have  for  our  childhood  is 

not  wholly  justifiable :  so  much  a  man 

may  lay  down  without  fear  of  public  ribaldry  ; 

for   although   we   shake   our   heads  over   the 

change,  we  are  not  unconscious  of  the  manifold 

36 


advantages  of  our  new  state.  What  we  lose  in 
generous  impulse  we  more  than  gain  in  the 
habit  of  generously  watching  others ;  and  the 
capacity  to  enjoy  Shakespeare  may  balance  a 
lost  appetite  for  playing  at  soldiers. 

T  F  a  man  lives  to  any  considerable  age,  it 
•*•  cannot  be  denied  that  he  laments  his 
imprudences,  but  I  notice  he  often  laments  his 
youth  a  deal  more  bitterly  and  with  a  more 
genuine  intonation. 

'"pHERE    is   something   irreverent   in   the 
•*•       speculation,    but   perhaps   the   want   of 
power  has  more  to  do  with  wise  resolutions  of 
age  than  we  are  always  willing  to  admit. 

"DEOPLE  may  lay  down  their  lives  with 
-*•  cheerfulness  in  the  sure  expectation  oi  )  v. 
a  blessed  immortality  ;  but  that  is  a  different 
affair  from  giving  up  youth,  with  all  its  ad- 
mirable pleasures,  in  the  hope  of  a  better 
quality  of  gruel  in  a  more  than  problematical, 
nay,  more  than  improbable,  old  age. 

CHILDHOOD  must  pass  away,  and  then 
youth,  as  surely  as  age  approaches.  The 
true  wisdom  is  to  be  always  seasonable,  and  to 
change  with  a  good  grace  in  changing  circum 
stances.  To  love  playthings  well  as  a  child,  tr 
lead  an  adventurous  and  honourable  youth,  and 
to  settle  when  the  time  arrives,  into  a  green  and 

37 


smiling  age,  is  to  be  a  good  artist  in  life  and 
deserve  well  of  yourself  and  your  neighbour. 

A  GE  asks  with  timidity  to  be  spared  in- 
"^^  tolerable  pain ;  youth,  taking  fortune 
by  the  beard,  demands  joy  like  a  right. 

T  T  is  not  possible  to  keep  the  mind  in  a  state 
•*•  of  accurate  balance  and  blank  ;  and  even 
if  you  could  do  so,  instead  of  coming  ultimately 
to  the  right  conclusion,  you  would  be  very  apt 
to  remain  in  a  state  of  balance  and  blank  to 
perpetuity.  Even  in  quite  intermediate  stages, 
a  dash  of  enthusiasm  is  not  a  thing  to  be 
ashamed  of  in  the  retrospect :  if  St.  Paul  had 
not  been  a  very  zealous  Pharisee,  he  would 
have  been  a  colder  Christian.  For  my  part,  I 
look  back  to  the  time  when  I  was  a  Socialist 
with  something  like  regret.  I  have  convinced 
myself  (for  the  moment)  that  we  had  better 
leave  these  great  changes  to  what  we  call  blind 
forces ;  their  blindness  being  so  much  more  per- 
spicacious than  the  little,  peering,  partial  eye- 
sight of  men.  I  seem  to  see  that  my  own 
scheme  would  not  answer  ;  and  all  the  other 
schemes  I  ever  heard  propounded  would  de- 
press some  elements  of  goodness  just  as  much 
as  they  encouraged  others.  Now  I  know  that 
in  thus  turning  Conservative  with  years,  I  am 
going  through  the  normal  cycle  of  change 
and  travelling  in  the  common  orbit  of  men'* 
opinions. 


'T'HOSE  who  go  the  devil  in  youth,  with 
A  anything  like  a  fair  chance,  were  pro- 
bably little  worth  saving  from  the  first ;  they 
must  have  been  feeble  fellows — creatures  made 
of  putty  and  pack-thread,  without  steel  or  fire, 
anger  or  true  joyfulness,  in  their  composition  ; 
we  may  sympathise  with  their  parents,  but 
there  is  not  much  cause  to  go  into  mourning 
for  themselves ;  for  to  be  quite  honest,  the 
weak  brother  is  the  worst  of  mankind. 

/T*HE  follies  of  youth  have  a  basis  in  sound 
•*•  reason,  just  as  much  as  the  embarrassing 
questions  put  by  babes  and  sucklings.  Their 
most  anti-social  acts  indicate  the  defects  of  our 
society.  When  the  torrent  sweeps  the  man 
against  a  boulder,  you  must  expect  him  to 
scream,  and  you  need  not  be  surprised  if  the 
scream  is  sometimes  a  theory.  .  .  .  But  it  is 
better  to  be  a  fool  than  to  be  dead.  It  is 
better  to  emit  a  scream  in  the  shape  of  a  theory 
than  to  be  entirely  insensible  to  the  jars  and 
incongruities  of  life  and  take  everything  as 
it  comes  in  a  forlorn  stupidity.  Some  people 
swallow  the  universe  like  a  pill;  they  travel  on 
through  the  world,  like  smiling  images  pushed 
from  behind.  For  God's  sake  give  me  the 
young  man  who  has  brains  enough  to  make  a 
fool  of  himself !  As  for  the  others,  the  irony 
of  facts  shall  take  it  out  of  their  hands,  and 
make  fools  of  them  in  downright  earnest,  ere 
the  farce  be  over.  There  shall  be  such  a  mop- 
39 


ping  and  a  mowing  at  the  last  day,  and  such 
blushing  and  confusion  of  countenance  for  all 
those  who  have  been  wise  in  their  own  esteem, 
and  have  not  learnt  the  rough  lessons  that 
youth  hands  on  to  age.  If  we  are  indeed  here 
to  perfect  and  complete  our  own  natures,  and 
grow  larger,  stronger,  and  more  sympathetic 
against  some  nobler  career  in  the  future,  we 
had  all  best  bestir  ourselves  to  the  utmost 
while  we  have  the  time.  To  equip  a  dull, 
respectable  person  with  wings  would  be  but  to 
make  a  parody  of  an  angel. 

TT  AD  he  but  talkeu— talked  freely— let  him- 
•*•  •*•  self  gu?u  out  in  words  (the  way  youth 
loves  to  do,  and  should)  there  might  have 
been  no  tale  to  write  upon  the  Weirs  of 
Hermiston. 

A  YOUNG  man  feels  himself  one  too  many 
/"*•  in  the  world  ;  his  is  a  painful  situation  ; 
he  has  no  calling  ;  no  obvious  utility  ;  no  ties 
but  to  his  parents,  and  these  he  is  sure  to 
disregard.  I  do  not  think  that  a  proper 
allowance  has  been  made  for  this  true  cause  of 
suffering  in  youth  ;  but  by  the  mere  fact  of  a 
prolonged  existence,  we  outgrow  either  the 
fact  or  else  the  feeling.  Either  we  become  so 
callously  accustomed  to  our  own  useless  figure 
in  the  world,  or  else — and  this,  thank  God,  in 
the  majority  of  cases — we  so  collect  about  us 
40 


the  interest  or  the  love  of  our  fellows,  so 
multiply  our  effective  part  in  the  affairs  of  life, 
that  we  need  to  entertain  no  longer  the  question 
of  our  right  to  be. 

TT  had  been  long  his  practice  to  prophesy 
•*•  for  his  second  son  a  career  of  ruin  and 
disgrace.  There  is  an  advantage  in  this  art- 
less parental  habit.  Doubtless  the  father  is 
interested  in  his  son ;  but  doubtless  also  the 
prophet  grows  to  be  interested  in  his  prophecies. 
If  the  one  goes  wrong  the  others  come  true. 

\\7 HEN  the  old  man  waggles  his  head  and 
says,  '  Ah,  so  I  thought  when  I  was 
your  age,'  he  has  proved  the  youth's  case. 
Doubtless,  whether  from  growth  of  experience 
or  decline  of  animal  heat,  he  thinks  so  no 
longer;  but  he  thought  so  while  he  was  young; 
and  all  men  have  thought  so  while  they  were 
young,  since  there  was  dew  in  the  morning  or 
hawthorn  in  May  ;  and  here  is  another  young 
man  adding  his  vote  to  those  of  previous 
generations  and  riveting  another  link  to  the 
chain  of  testimony.  It  is  as  natural  and  as 
right  for  a  young  man  to  be  imprudent  and 
exaggerated,  to  live  in  swoops  and  circles,  and 
beat  about  his  cage  like  any  other  wild  thing 
newly  captured,  as  it  is  for  old  men  to  turn 
grey,  or  mothers  to  love  their  offspring,  or 
heroes  to  die  for  something  worthier  than  th«il 
lives. 

41 


is  the  time  to  go  flashing  from  one 
•*•  end  of  the  world  to  the  other  both  in 
mind  and  body;  to  try  the  manners  of  different 
nations ;  to  hear  the  chimes  at  midnight ;  to 
see  sunrise  in  town  and  country  ;  to  be  con- 
verted at  a  revival ;  to  circumnavigate  the 
metaphysics,  write  halting  verses,  run  a  mile 
to  see  a  fire,  and  wait  all  day  long  in  the 
theatre  to  applaud  Hernani.  There  is  some 
meaning  in  the  old  theory  about  wild  oats;  and 
a  man  who  has  not  had  his  green-sickness  and 
got  done  with  it  for  good  is  as  little  to  be 
depended  on  as  an  unvaccinated  infant. 

TIT" HEN  we  grow  elderly,  how  the  room 
*  *  brightens  and  begins  to  look  as  it  ought 
to  look,  on  the  entrance  of  youth,  grace,  heakh 
and  comeliness  !  You  do  not  want  them  for 
yourself,  perhaps  not  even  for  your  son,  but 
you  look  on  smiling ;  and  when  you  recall 
their  images — again  it  is  with  a  smile.  I  defy 
you  to  see  or  think  of  them  and  not  smile  with 
an  infinite  and  intimate  but  quite  impersonal 
pleasure. 

'T^O  speak  truth  there  must  be  moral  equality 
•*•       or  else  no  respect ;  and  hence  between 
parent  and  child  intercourse  is  apt  to  degenerate 
into  a  verbal  fencing-bout,  and  misapprehen- 
sions  to   become   engrained.      And    there   is 
another  side  to  this,  for  the  parent  begins  with 
42 


an  imperfect  notion  of  the  child's  character, 
formed  in  early  years  or  during  the  equinoctial 
gales  of  youth  ;  to  this  he  adheres,  noting  only 
the  facts  which  suit  with  his  pre-conception ; 
and  wherever  a  person  fancies  himself  unjustly 
judged,  he  at  once  and  finally  gives  up  the 
effort  to  speak  truth. 


O  O,  as  we  grow  old,  a  sort  of  equable  jog- 
•^  trot  of  feeling  is  substituted  for  the 
violent  ups  and  downs  of  passion  and  disgust ; 
the  same  influence  that  restrains  our  hopes 
quiets  our  apprehensions  ;  if  the  pleasures  are 
less  intense,  the  troubles  are  milder  and  more 
tolerable  ;  and  in  a  word,  this  period  for  which 
we  are  asked  to  hoard  up  everything  as  for  a 
time  of  famine,  is,  in  its  own  right,  the  richest, 
easiest,  and  happiest  of  life.  Nay,  by  managing 
its  own  work  and  following  its  own  happy 
inspiration,  youth  is  doing  the  best  it  can  to 
endow  the  leisure  of  age.  A  full,  busy  youth 
is  your  only  prelude  to  a  self-contained  and 
independent  age ;  and  the  muff  inevitably 
develops  into  a  bore. 


/"PO  know  what  you  like  is  the  beginning 
•*•       of  wisdom  and  of  old  age.      Youth  is 
wholly  experimental.     The  essence  and  charm 
of  that  unquiet  and  delightful  epoch  is  ignor- 
ance of  self  as  well  as  ignorance  of  life. 
43 


'I  *  HE  schoolboy  has  a  keen  sense  of  humour. 
•*•  Heroes  he  learns  to  understand  and  to 
admire  in  books ;  but  he  is  not  forward  to 
recognise  the  heroic  under  the  traits  of  any 
contemporary. 


"p\ISCREDITED  as  they  are  in  practice, 

*-^  the  cowardly  proverbs  hold  their  own 
in  theory ;  and  it  is  another  instance  of  the 
same  spirit,  that  the  opinions  of  old  men  about 
life  have  been  accepted  as  final.  All  sorts  of 
allowances  are  made  for  the  illusions  of  youth; 
and  none,  or  almost  none,  for  the  disenchant- 
ments  of  age.  It  is  held  to  be  a  good  taunt, 
and  somehow  or  other  to  clinch  the  question 
logically,  when  an  old  gentleman  waggles  his 
head  and  says  :  'Ah,  so  I  thought  when  I  was 
your  age.'  It  is  not  thought  an  answer  at  all, 
if  the  young  man  retorts  :  '  My  venerable  sir, 
so  I  shall  most  probably  think  when  I  am 
yours.'  And  yet  the  one  is  as  good  as  the 
other  :  pass  for  pass,  tit  for  tat,  a  Roland  for 
an  Oliver. 


"\1THAT  shall  we  be  when  we  grow  really 
*  *  old  ?  Of  yore,  a  man  was  thought  to 
lay  on  restrictions  and  acquire  new  deadweight 
of  mournful  experience  with  every  year,  till  he 
looked  back  on  his  youth  as  the  very  summer 
of  impulse  and  freedom. 


A  ND  it  may  be  worth  while  to  add  that 
•^"^  these  clouds  rolled  away  in  their  season, 
and  that  all  clouds  roll  away  at  last,  and  the 
troubles  of  youth  in  particular  are  things  but 
of  a  moment 

'T'HROUGH  what  little  channels,  by  what 
•*•  hints  and  premonitions,  the  conscious- 
ness of  the  man's  art  dawns  first  upon  the 
child,  it  should  be  not  only  interesting  but 
instructive  to  inquire.  A  matter  of  curiosity 
to-day,  it  will  become  the  ground  of  science 
to-morrow.  From  the  mind  of  childhood  there 
is  more  history  and  more  philosophy  to  be 
fished  up  than  from  all  the  printed  volumes  in 
a  library. 

T  COULD  not  finish  The  Pirate  when  I  was 
A  a  child,  I  have  never  finished  it  yet ; 
Peveril  of  the  Peak  dropped  half  way  through 
from  my  schoolboy  hands,  and  though  I  have 
since  waded  to  an  end  in  a  kind  of  wager  with 
myself,  the  exercise  was  quite  without  enjoy- 
ment. There  is  something  disquieting  in  the 
considerations.  I  still  think  the  visit  to  Ponto's 
the  best  part  of  the  Book  of  Snobs :  does  that 
mean  that  I  was  right  when  I  was  a  child,  or 
does  it  mean  that  I  have  never  grown  since 
then,  that  the  child  is  not  the  man's  father, 
but  the  man  ?  and  that  I  came  into  the  world 
with  all  my  faculties  complete,  and  have  only 
learned  sinsyne  to  be  more  tolerant  of  boredom? 
45 


IP  HE  child  thinks  much  in  images,  words 
•*•       are  very  live  to  him,  phrases  that  imply 
a  picture  eloquent  beyond  their  value. 

C  OMEHOW  my  playmate  had  vanished,  or 
*^  is  out  of  the  story,  as  the  sagas  say,  but 
I  was  sent  into  the  village  on  an  errand  ;  and, 
taking  a  book  of  fairy  tales,  went  down  alone 
through  a  fir-wood,  reading  as  I  walked.  How 
often  since  then  has  it  befallen  me  to  be  happy 
even  so  ;  but  that  was  the  first  time  :  the  shock 
of  that  pleasure  I  have  never  since  forgot,  and 
if  my  mind  serves  me  to  the  last,  I  never  shall; 
for  it  was  then  I  knew  I  loved  reading. 

/T*HE  remainder  of  my  childish  recollections 
are  all  of  the  matter  that  was  read  to 
me,  and  not  of  any  manner  in  the  words.  If 
these  pleased  me,  it  was  unconsciously ;  I 
listened  for  news  of  the  great  vacant  world 
upon  whose  edge  I  stood ;  I  listened  for  de- 
lightful plots  that  I  might  re-enact  in  play,  and 
romantic  scenes  and  circumstances  that  I  might 
call  up  before  me,  with  closed  eyes,  when  I 
was  tired  of  Scotland,  and  home,  and  that 
weary  prison  of  the  sick-chamber  in  which  I 
lay  so  long  in  durance. 

T  ROSE  and  lifted  a  corner  of  the  blind. 
•*•  Over  the  black  belt  of  the  garden  I  saw 
the  long  line  of  Queen  Street,  with  here  and 
there  a  lighted  window.  How  often  before 
46 


had  my  nurse  lifted  me  out  of  bed  and  pointed 
them  out  to  me,  while  we  wondered  together 
if,  there  also,  there  were  children  that  could 
not  sleep,  and  if  these  lighted  oblongs1  were 
signs  of  those  that  waited  like  us  for  the 
morning. 

'T'HERE  never  was  a  child  but  has  hunted 
•*•  gold,  and  been  a  pirate,  and  a  military 
commander,  and  a  bandit  of  the  mountains ; 
but  has  fought,  and  suffered  shipwieck  and 
prison,  and  imbrued  its  little  hands  in  gore, 
and  gallantly  retrieved  the  lost  battle,  and 
triumphantly  protected  innocence  and  beauty. 

NONE  more  than  children  are  concerned 
for  beauty,  and,  above  all,  for  beauty 
in  the  old. 

C  O  in  youth,  like  Moses  from  the  mountain, 
^  we  have  sights  of  that  House  Beautiful 
of  art  which  we  shall  never  enter.  They  are 
dreams  and  unsubstantial ;  visions  of  style  that 
repose  upon  no  base  of  human  meaning ;  the 
last  heart-throb  of  that  excited  amateur  who 
has  to  die  in  all  of  us  before  the  artist  can  be 
born.  But  they  come  in  such  a  rainbow  of 
glory  that  all  subsequent  achievement  appears 
dull  and  earthly  in  comparison.  We  are  all 
artists ;  almost  all  in  the  age  of  illusion, 
cultivating  an  imaginary  genius,  and  walking 
to  the  strains  of  some  deceiving  Ariel ;  small 
47 


wonder,  indeed,  if  we  were  happy  !  But  art, 
of  whatever  nature,  is  a  kind  of  mistress ;  and 
though  these  dreams  of  youth  fall  by  their  own 
baselessness,  others  succeed,  grave  and  more 
substantial ;  the  symptoms  change,  the  amiable 
malady  endures ;  and  still  at  an  equal  dis- 
tance, the  House  Beautiful  shines  upon  its 
hill-top. 

/CHILDREN,  for  instance,  are  able  enough 
^^  to  see,  but  they  have  no  great  faculty 
for  looking ;  they  do  not  use  their  eyes  for 
the  pleasure  of  using  them,  but  for  by-ends  of 
their  own  ;  and  the  things  I  call  to  mind 
seeing  most  vividly  were  not  beautiful  in 
themselves,  but  merely  interesting  or  enviable 
to  me,  as  I  thought  they  might  be  turned  to 
practical  account  in  play. 

/T*HE  true  parallel  for  play  is  not  to  be 
•*•  found,  of  course,  in  conscious  art, 
which,  though  it  be  derived  from  play,  is 
itself  an  abstract,  impersonal  thing,  and  de- 
pends largely  upon  philosophical  interests 
beyond  the  scope  of  childhood.  It  is  when 
we  make  castles  in  the  air  and  personate  the 
leading  character  in  our  own  romances,  that 
we  return  to  the  spirit  of  our  first  years. 
Only,  there  are  several  reasons  why  the  spirit 
is  no  longer  so  agreeable  to  indulge.  Now- 
adays, when  we  admit  this  personal  element 
into  our  divagations,  we  are  apt  to  stir  up 


uncomfortable  and  sorrowful  memories,  and 
remind  ourselves  sharply  of  old  wounds.  .  .  . 
Alas !  when  we  betake  ourselves  to  our 
intellectual  form  of  play,  sitting  quietly  by  the 
£re  or  lying  prone  in  bed,  we  rouse  many  hot 
feelings  for  which  we  can  find  no  outlet. 
Substitutes  are  not  acceptable  to  the  mature 
mind,  which  desires  the  thing  itself;  and  even 
to  rehearse  a  triumphant  dialogue  with  one's 
enemy,  although  it  is  perhaps  the  most  satis- 
factory piece  of  play  still  left  within  our  reach, 
is  not  entirely  satisfying,  and  is  even  apt  to 
lead  to  a  visit  and  an  interview  which  may 
be  the  reverse  of  triumphant  after  all. 


*\17"HATEVER  we  are  to  expect  at  the 
*  *  hands  of  children,  it  should  not  be 
any  peddling  exactitude  about  matters  of  fact. 
They  walk  in  a  vain  show,  and  among  mists 
and  rainbows ;  they  are  passionate  after 
dreams  and  unconcerned  about  realities ; 
speech  is  a  difficult  art  not  wholly  learned ; 
and  there  is  nothing  in  their  own  tastes  or 
purposes  to  teach  them  what  we  mean  by 
abstract  truthfulness.  When  a  bad  writer  is 
inexact,  even  if  he  can  look  back  on  half  a 
century  of  years,  we  charge  him  with  incom- 
petence and  not  with  dishonesty.  And  why 
not  extend  the  same  allowance  to  imperfect 
speakers  ?  Let  a  stockbroker  be  dead  stupid 
about  poetry,  or  a  poet  inexact  in  the  details 
r  40 


of  business,  and  we  excuse  them  heartily  from1 
blame.  But  show  us  a  miserable,  unbreeched, 
human  entity,  whose  whole  profession  it  is  to 
take  a  tub  for  a  fortified  town  and  a  shaving- 
brush  for  the  deadly  stiletto,  and  who  passes 
three-fourths  of  his  time  in  a  dream  and  the 
rest  in  open  self-deception,  and  we  expect 
him  to  be  as  nice  upon  a  matter  of  fact  as  a 
scientific  expert  bearing  evidence.  Upon  my 
heart,  I  think  it  less  than  decent :  you  do  not 
consider  how  little  the  child  sees,  or  how 
swift  he  is  to  weave  what  he  has  seen  into 
bewildering  fiction ;  and  that  he  cares  no 
more  for  what  you  call  truth,  than  you  for  a 
gingerbread  dragoon. 

It  would  be  easy  to  leave  them  in  their 
native  cloudland,  where  they  figure  so  prettily 
— pretty  like  flowers  and  innocent  like  dogs. 
They  will  come  out  of  their  gardens  soon 
enough,  and  have  to  go  into  offices  and  the 
witness-box.  Spare  them  yet  a  while,  O 
conscientious  parent !  Let  them  doze  among 
their  playthings  yet  a  little  !  for  who  knows 
what  a  rough,  warfaring  existence  lies  before 
them  in  the  future  ? 

'\7"OU  are  a  friend  of  Archie  Weir's? 'said 
•^  one  to  Frank  Innes ;  and  Innes  re- 
plied, with  his  usual  flippancy  and  more  than 
his  usual  insight :  '  I  know  Weir,  but  I  never 
met  Archie.'  No  one  had  met  Archie,  a 
malady  most  incident  to  only  sons.  He  fle* 


his  private  signal,  and  none  heeded  it  ;  it 
seemed  he  was  abroad  in  a  world  from  which 
the  very  hope  of  intimacy  was  banished  ;  and 
he  looked  round  about  him  on  the  concourse 
of  his  fellow-students,  and  forward  to  the 
trivial  days  and  acquaintances  that  were  to 
come,  without  hope  or  interest. 


'  A/T  Y  P°°r'  ^ear  b°y  !  '  observed  Glen- 
*•  •*•  almond.  *  My  poor,  dear  and,  if  you 
will  allow  me  to  say  so,  very  foolish  boy  i- 
You  are  only  discovering  where  you  are  ;  to 
one  of  your  temperament,  or  of  mine,  a  pain- 
ful discovery.  The  world  was  not  made  for 
us  ;  it  was  made  for  ten  hundred  millions  of 
me,  all  different  from  each  other  and  from  us  ; 
there  's  no  royal  road,  we  just  have  to  sclambet 
and  tumble.' 

A  LAS  and  alas  !  you  may  take  it  how  you 
•**•  will,  but  the  services  of  no  single  in- 
dividual are  indispensable.  Atlas  was  just  a 
gentleman  with  a  protracted  nightmare  !  And 
yet  you  see  merchants  who  go  and  labour 
themselves  into  a  great  fortune  and  thence 
into  the  bankruptcy  court  ;  scribblers  who 
keep  scribbling  at  little  articles  until  their 
temper  is  a  cross  to  all  who  come  about  them, 
as  though  Pharaoh  should  set  the  Israelites  to 
make  a  pin  instead  of  a  pyramid  ;  and  fine 
young  men  who  work  themselves  into  a  de- 
cline, and  are  driven  off  in  a  hearse  with 
51 


white  plumes  upon  it.  Would  you  not  sup- 
pose these  persons  had  been  whispered,  by 
the  Master  of  the  Ceremonies,  the  promise  of 
some  momentous  destiny  ?  and  that  this  luke- 
warm bullet  on  which  they  play  their  farces 
was  the  bull's-eye  and  centrepoint  of  all  the 
universe?  And  yet  it  is  not  so.  The  ends 
for  which  they  give  away  their  priceless  youth, 
for  all  they  know,  may  be  chimerical,  cr 
hurtful ;  the  glory  and  riches  they  expect  may 
never  eome,  or  may  find  them  indifferent ; 
and  they  and  the  world  they  inhabit  are  so 
inconsiderable  that  the  mind  freezes  at  the 
thought. 

A  S  we  go  catching  and  catching  at  this  or 
•**•  that  corner  of  knowledge,  now  getting 
a  foresight  of  generous  possibilities,  now 
chilled  with  a  glimpse  of  prudence,  we  may 
compare  the  headlong  course  of  our  years  to 
a  swift  torrent  in  which  a  man  is  carried 
away ;  now  he  is  dashed  against  a  boulder, 
now  he  grapples  for  a  moment  to  a  trailing 
spray ;  at  the  end,  he  is  hurled  out  and 
overwhelmed  in  a  dark  and  bottomless 
ocean.  We  have  no  more  than  glimpses  and 
touches  ;  we  are  torn  away  from  our  theories ; 
we  are  spun  round  and  round  and  shown 
this  or  the  other  view  of  life,  until  only  fools 
or  knaves  can  hold  to  their  opinions.  .  .  . 
All  our  attributes  are  modified  or  changed  ; 
and  it  will  be  a  poor  account  of  us  if  our 


views  do  not  modify  and  change  in  a  propor- 
tion. To  hold  the  same  views  at  forty  as  we 
held  at  twenty  is  to  have  been  stupefied  for 
a  score  of  years,  and  take  rank,  not  as  a 
prophet,  but  as  an  unteachable  .brat,  well 
birched  and  none  the  wiser.  It  is  as  if  a 
ship  captain  should  sail  to  India  from  the 
Port  of  London  ;  and  having  brought  a  chart 
of  the  Thames  on  deck  at  his  first  setting  out, 
should  obstinately  use  no  other  for  the  whole 
voyage. 

T  T  is  good  to  have  been  young  in  youth  and, 
•*•  as  years  go  on,  to  grow  older.  Many  are 
already  old  before  they  are  through  their 
teens  ;  but  to  travel  deliberately  through  one's 
ages  is  to  get  the  heart  out  of  a  liberal  educa- 
tion. Times  change,  opinions  vary  to  their 
opposite,  and  still  this  world  appears  a  brave 
gymnasium,  full  of  sea-bathing,  and  horse 
exercise,  and  bracing,  manly  virtues ;  and 
what  can  be  more  encouraging  than  to  find 
the  friend  who  was  welcome  at  one  age,  still 
welcome  at  another  ?  Our  affections  and 
beliefs  are  wiser  than  we  ;  the  best  that  is  in 
us  is  better  than  we  can  understand ;  for  it  is 
grounded  beyond  experience,  and  guides  us, 
blindfold  but  safe,  from  one  age  on  to  another. 

T)UT  faces  have  a  trick  of  growing  more 

-*-^     and  more   spiritualised  and  abstract  in 

the  memory,   until  nothing  remains  of  them 

S3 


but  a  look,  a  haunting  expression ;  just  that 
secret  quality  in  a  face  that  is  apt  to  slip  out 
somehow  under  the  cunningest  painter's  touch, 
and  leave  the  portrait  dead  for  the  lack  of  it. 

TDITIFUL  is  the  case  of  the  blind,  who 
•*•  cannot  read  the  face ;  pitiful  that  of  the 
deaf,  who  cannot  follow  the  changes  of  the 
voice.  And  there  are  others  also  to  be  pitied  ; 
for  there  are  some  of  an  inert,  uneloquent 
nature,  who  have  been  denied  all  the  symbols 
of  communication,  who  have  neither  a  lively 
play  of  facial  expression,  nor  speaking  ges- 
tures, nor  a  responsive  voice,  nor  yet  the  gift 
of  frank,  explanatory  speech :  people  truly 
made  of  clay,  people  tied  for  life  into  a  bag 
which  no  one  can  undo.  They  are  poorer 
than  the  gipsy,  for  their  heart  can  speak  no 
language  under  heaven. 

T7OR  my  part,  I  can  see  few  things  more 
•^  desirable,  after  the  possession  of  such 
radical  qualities  as  honour  and  humour  and 
pathos,  than  to  have  a  lively  and  not  a  stolid 
countenance ;  to  have  looks  to  correspond 
with  every  feeling ;  to  be  elegant  and  delight- 
ful in  person,  so  that  we  shall  please  even  in 
the  intervals  of  active  pleasing,  and  may 
never  discredit  speech  with  uncouth  manners 
or  become  unconsciously  our  own  burlesques. 
But  of  all  unfortunates  there  is  one  creature 
(for  I  will  not  call  him  man)  conspicuous  in 
54 


misfortune.  This  is  he  who  has  forfeited  his 
birthright  of  expression,  who  has  cultivated 
artful  intonations,  who  has  taught  his  face 
tricks,  like  a  pet  monkey,  and  on  every  side 
perverted  or  cut  off  his  means  of  communica- 
tion with  his  fellow-men.  The  body  is  a 
house  of  many  windows  :  there  we  all  sit, 
showing  ourselves  and  crying  on  the  passers- 
by  to  come  and  love  us.  But  this  fellow  has 
filled  his  windows  with  opaque  glass,  elegantly 
coloured.  His  house  may  be  admired  for  its 
design,  the  crowd  may  pause  before  the 
stained  windows,  but  meanwhile  the  poor 
proprietor  must  lie  languishing  within,  UD- 
comforted,  unchangeably  alone. 


n^IIE  lads  go  forth  pricked  with  the  spirit 
•*•  of  adventure  and  the  desire  to  rise  in 
life,  and  leave  their  homespun  elders  grumbling 
and  wondering  over  the  event.  Once,  at  a 
village  called  Lausanne,  I  met  one  of  these 
disappointed  parents :  a  drake  who  had 
fathered  a  wild  swan  and  seen  it  take  wing 
and  disappear.  The  wild  swan  in  question 
was  now  an  apothecary  in  Brazil.  He  had 
flown  by  way  of  Bordeaux,  and  first  landed 
in  America,  bare-headed  and  bare-footed,  and 
with  a  single  halfpenny  in  his  pocket.  And 
now  he  was  an  apothecary  !  Such  a  wonderful 
thing  is  an  adventurous  life  !  I  thought  he 
might  as  well  have  stayed  at  home ;  but  you 
55 


never  can  tell  wherein  a  man's  life  consists, 
nor  in  what  he  sets  his  pleasure :  one  to 
drink,  another  to  marry,  a  third  to  write 
scurrilous  articles  and  be  repeatedly  caned  in 
public,  and  now  this  fourth,  perhaps,  to  be  an 
apothecaiy  in  Brazil.  As  for  his  old  father, 
he  could  conceive  no  reason  for  the  lad's 
behaviour.  '  I  had  always  bread  for  him,* 
he  said ;  '  he  ran  away  to  annoy  me.  He 
loved  to  annoy  me.  He  had  no  gratitude.' 
But  at  heart  he  was  swelling  with  pride  over 
his  travelled  offspring,  and  he  produced  a 
letter  out  of  his  pocket,  where,  as  he  said, 
it  was  rotting,  a  mere  lump  of  paper  rags, 
and  waved  it  gloriously  in  the  air.  '  This 
comes  from  America,'  he  cried,  'six  thousand 
leagues  away  ! '  And  the  wine-shop  audience 
looked  upon  it  with  a  certain  thrill. 


/T*HE  fame  of  other  lands  had  reached 
•*•  them ;  the  name  of  the  eternal  city 
rang  in  their  ears ;  they  were  not  colonists, 
but  pilgrims  ;  they  travelled  towards  wine  and 
gold  and  sunshine,  but  their  hearts  were  set 
on  something  higher.  That  divine  unrest, 
that  old  stinging  trouble  of  humanity  that 
makes  all  high  achievements  and  all  miserable 
failures,  the  same  that  spread  wings  with 
Icarus,  the  same  that  sent  Columbus  into  the 
desolate  Atlantic,  inspired  and  supported  these 
barbarians  on  their  perilous  march. 
56 


is  more  adventure  in  the  life  of 
•*•  the  working  man  who  descends  as  a 
common  soldier  into  the  battle  of  life,  than 
in  that  of  the  millionaire  who  sits  apart  in  an 
office,  like  Von  Moltke,  and  only  directs  the 
manoeuvres  by  telegraph.  Give  me  to  hear 
about  the  career  of  him  who  is  in  the  thick 
of  the  business ;  to  whom  one  change  of 
market  means  an  empty  belly,  and  another  a 
copious  and  savoury  meal.  This  is  not  the 
philosophical,  but  the  human  side  of  economics ; 
it  interests  like  a  story  ;  and  the  life  of  all 
who  are  thus  situated  partakes  in  a  small 
way  of  the  charm  of  Robinson  Crusoe  ;  for 
every  step  is  critical,  and  human  life  is  pre- 
sented to  you  naked  and  verging  to  Its  lowest 
terms. 

A  N  aspiration  is  a  joy  for  ever,  a  possession 
**•  as  solid  as  a  landed  estate,  a  fortune 
which  we  can  never  exhaust  and  which  gives 
us  year  by  year  a  revenue  of  pleasurable 
activity.  To  have  many  of  these  is  to  be 
spiritually  rich. 

/"PO  be  wholly  devoted  to  some  intellectual 
•*•       exercise  is  to   have  succeeded  in  life ; 
and    perhaps    only  in    law  and    the    higher 
mathematics  may  this  devotion  be  maintained, 
suffice  to  itself  without  reaction,  and  find  con- 
tinual rewards  without  excitement. 
57 


CTUDY  and  experiment,  to  some  rare 
^  natures,  is  the  unbroken  pastime  of  a 
life.  These  are  enviable  natures  ;  people  shut 
in  the  house  by  sickness  often  bitterly  envy 
them ;  but  the  commoner  man  cannot  con- 
tinue to  exist  upon  such  altitudes  :  his  feet 
itch  for  physical  adventure;  his  blood  boils 
for  physical  dangers,  pleasures,  and  triumphs  ; 
his  fancy,  the  looker  after  new  things,  cannot 
continue  to  look  for  them  in  books  and 
crucibles,  but  must  seek  them  on  the  breath- 
ing stage  of  life. 

T  IFE  goes  before  us,  infinite  in  complica- 
•*-*  tion  ;  attended  by  the  most  various  and 
surprising  meteors  ;  appealing  at  once  to  the 
eye,  to  the  ear,  to  the  mind — the  seat  of 
wonder,  to  the  touch — so  thrillingly  delicate, 
and  to  the  belly — so  imperious  when  starved. 
It  combines  and  employs  in  its  manifestation 
the  method  and  material,  not  of  one  art  only, 
but  of  all  the  arts.  Music  is  but  an  arbitrary 
trifling  with  a  few  of  life's  majestic  chords; 
painting  is  but  a  shadow  of  its  pageantry  of 
light  and  colour ;  literature  does  but  drily 
indicate  that  wealth  of  incident,  of  moral 
obligation,  of  virtue,  vice,  action,  rapture  and 
agony,  with  which  it  teems.  To  '  compete 
with  life,'  whose  sun  we  cannot  look  upon, 
whose  passions  and  diseases  waste  and  slay  us 
— to  compete  with  the  flavour  of  wine,  the 
beauty  of  the  dawn,  the  scorching  of  fire,  the 
58 


bitterness  of  death  and  separation  —  here  1st, 
indeed,  a  projected  escalade  of  heaven ;  here 
are,  indeed,  labours  for  a  Hercules  in  a  dress 
coat,  armed  with  a  pen  and  a  dictionary  to 
depict  the  passions,  armed  with  a  tube  of 
superior  flake-white  to  paint  the  portrait  of 
the  insufferable  sun.  No  art  is  true  in  this 
sense  :  none  can  '  compete  with  life ' :  not 
even  history,  built  indeed  of  indisputable  facts, 
but  these  facts  robbed  of  their  vivacity  and 
sting ;  so  that  even  when  we  read  of  the  sack 
of  a  city  or  the  fall  of  an  empire,  we  are 
surprised,  and  justly  commend  the  author's 
talent,  if  our  pulse  be  quickened.  And  mark, 
for  a  last  differentia,  that  this  quickening  of 
the  pulse  is,  in  almost  every  case,  purely 
agreeable ;  that  these  phantom  reproductions 
of  experience,  even  at  their  most  acute,  con- 
vey decided  pleasure  ;  while  experience  itself, 
in  the  cockpit  of  life,  can  torture  and  slay. 

T  NTO  how  many  houses  would  not  the 
note  of  the  monastery  bell,  dividing  the 
day  into  manageable  portions,  bring  peace  of 
mind  and  healthful  activity  of  body  !  We 
speak  of  hardships,  but  the  true  hardship  is  to 
be  a  dull  fool,  and  permitted  to  mismanage 
life  in  our  own  dull  and  foolish  manner. 

"OUT,  struggle  as  you  please,  a  man  has  to 
^     work  in   this  world.      He  must  be  an 
honest  man  or  a  thief,  Loudon. 
59 


T  NDUSTRY  is,  In  itself  and  when  properly 
chosen,  delightful  and  profitable  to  the 
worker ;  and  when  your  toil  has  been  a 
pleasure,  you  have  not  earned  money  merely, 
but  money,  health,  delight,  and  moral  profit, 
all  in  one. 

'T^HE  cost -of  a  thing,'  says  he,  'is  the 
•*•  amount  of  what  I  will  call  life  which 
is  required  to  be  exchanged  for  it,  immediately 
or  in  the  long-run.'  I  have  been  accustomed 
to  put  it  to  myself,  perhaps  more  clearly,  that 
the  price  we  have  to  pay  for  money  is  paid  in 
liberty.  Between  these  two  ways  of  it,  at 
least,  the  reader  will  probably  not  fail  to  find 
a  third  definition  of  his  own;  and  it  follows, 
on  one  or  other,  that  a  man  may  pay  too 
dearly  for  his  livelihood,  by  giving,  in  Thoreau's 
terms,  his  whole  life  for  it,  or,  in  mine,  barter- 
ing for  it  the  whole  of  his  available  liberty, 
and  becoming  a  slave  till  death.  There  are 
two  questions  to  be  considered — the  quality 
of  what  we  buy,  and  the  price  we  have  to  pay 
for  it.  Do  you  want  a  thousand  a  year,  a  two 
thousand  a  year,  or  a  ten  thousand  a  year 
livelihood  ?  and  can  you  afford  the  one  you 
want  ?  It  is  a  matter  of  taste  ;  it  is  not  in 
the  least  degree  a  question  of  duty,  though 
commonly  supposed  so.  But  there  is  no 
authority  for  that  view  anywhere.  It  is  no- 
where in  the  Bible.  It  is  true  that  we  might 
do  a  vast  amount  of  good  if  we  were  weakly, 
60 


but  it  is  also  highly  improbable  ;  not  many  do  ; 
and  the  art  of  growing  rich  is  not  only  quite 
distinct  from  that  of  doing  good,  but  the 
practice  of  the  one  does  not  at  all  train  a  man 
for  practising  the  other. 

"\17"E  may  escape  uncongenial  toil,  only  to 
'  devote  ourselves  to  that  which  is  con- 
genial. It  is  only  to  transact  some  higher 
business  that  even  Apollo  dare  play  the  truant 
from  Admetus.  We  must  all  work  for  the 
sake  of  work  ;  we  must  all  work,  as  Thoreau 
says  again,  in  any  '  absorbing  pursuit — it  does 
not  much  matter  what,  so  it  be  honest';  but 
the  most  profitable  work  is  that  which  com- 
bines into  one  continued  effort  the  largest 
proportion  of  the  powers  and  desires  of  a 
man's  nature ;  that  into  which  he  will  plunge 
with  ardour,  and  from  which  he  will  desist 
with  reluctance  ;  in  which  he  will  know  the 
weariness  of  fatigue,  but  not  that  of  satiety; 
and  which  will  be  ever  fresh,  pleasing  and 
stimulating  to  his  taste.  Such  work  holds  a 
man  together,  braced  at  all  points;  it  does 
not  suffer  him  to  doze  or  wander  ;  it  keeps 
him  actively  conscious  of  himself,  yet  raised 
among  superior  interests ;  it  gives  him  the 
profit  of  industry  with  the  pleasures  of  a 
pastime.  This  is  what  his  art  should  be  to 
the  true  artist,  and  that  to  a  degree  unknown 
in  other  and  less  intimate  pursuits.  For 
other  professions  stand  apart  from  the  human 
61 


business  of  life ;  but  an  art  has  the  seat  at  the 
centre  of  the  artist's  doings  and  sufferings, 
deals  directly  with  his  experiences,  teaches 
him  the  lessons  of  his  own  fortunes  and  mis- 
haps, and  becomes  a  part  of  his  biography. 


"PAREWELL,  fair  day  and  fading  light ! 
•^       The  clay-born  here,  with  westward  sight, 
Marks  the  huge  sun  now  downward  soar. 
Farewell.     We  twain  shall  meet  no  more. 

Farewell.     I  watch  with  bursting  sigh 
My  late  contemned  occasion  die. 
I  linger  useless  in  my  tent : 
Farewell,  fair  day,  so  foully  spent  I 

Farewell,  fair  day.     If  any  God 
At  all  consider  this  poor  clod, 
He  who  the  fair  occasion  sent 
Prepared  and  placed  the  impediment. 

Let  him  diviner  vengeance  take — 
Give  me  to  sleep,  give  me  to  wake 
Girded  and  shod,  and  bid  me  play 
The  hero  in  the  coming  day  ! 


PERPETUAL  devotion  to  what  a  man  calls 
•^  his  business,  is  only  to  be  sustained  by 
perpetual  neglect  of  many  other  things.  And 
it  is  not  by  any  means  certain  that  a  man's 
business  is  the  most  important  thing  he  has  to 
do.  To  an  impartial  estimate  it  will  seem 
62 


clear  that  many  of  the  wisest,  most  virtuous, 
and  most  beneficent  parts  that  are  to  be 
played  upon  the  Theatre  of  Life  are  filled  by 
gratuitous  performers,  and  pass,  among  the 
world  at  large,  as  phases  of  idleness.  For  in 
that  Theatre,  not  only  the  walking  gentlemen, 
singing  chambermaids,  and  diligent  fiddlers 
in  the  orchestra,  but  those  who  look  on  and 
clap  their  hands  from  the  benches,  do  really 
play  a  part  and  fulfil  important  offices  towards 
the  general  result. 

'TMIE  fact  is,  fame  may  be  a  forethought 
•*•  and  an  afterthought,  but  it  is  too  abs- 
tract an  idea  to  move  people  greatly  in 
moments  of  swift  and  momentous  decision. 
It  is  from  something  more  immediate,  some 
determination  of  blood  to  the  head,  some  trick 
of  the  fancy,  that  the  breach  is  stormed  or  the 
bold  word  spoken.  I  am  sure  a  fellow  shoot- 
ing an  ugly  weir  in  a  canoe  has  exactly  as 
much  thought  about  fame  as  most  commanders 
going  into  battle  ;  and  yet  the  action,  fall  out 
how  it  will,  is  not  one  of  those  the  muse 
delights  to  celebrate.  Indeed,  it  is  difficult  to 
see  why  the  fellow  does  a  thing  so  nameless 
and  yet  so  formidable  to  look  at,  unless  on 
the  theory  that  he  likes  it. 

T  T  is  but  a  lying  cant  that  would  represent 

•*•     the  merchant  and  the  banker  as  people 

disinterestedly  toiling  for  mankind,  and  then 

63 


most  useful  when  absorbed  in  their  transac- 
tions ;  for  the  man  is  more  important  than  his 
services. 

T  T  was  my  custom,  as  the  hours  dragged  on, 
•*•  to  repeat  the  question,  'When  will  the 
carts  come  in  ? '  and  repeat  it  again  and  again 
until  at  last  those  sounds  arose  in  the  street 
that  I  have  heard  once  more  this  morning. 
The  road  before  our  house  is  a  great  thorough- 
fare for  early  carts.  I  know  not,  and  I  never 
have  known,  what  they  carry,  whence  they 
come,  or  whither  they  go.  But  I  know  that, 
iong  ere  dawn,  and  for  hours  together,  they 
stream  continuously  past,  with  the  same  rolling 
and  jerking  of  wheels,  and  the  same  clink  of 
horses'  feet.  It  was  not  for  nothing  that  they 
made  the  burthen  of  my  wishes  all  night 
through.  They  are  really  the  first  throbbings 
of  life,  the  harbingers  of  day  ;  and  it  pleases 
you  as  much  to  hear  them  as  it  must  please  a 
shipwrecked  seaman  once  again  to  grasp  a 
hand  of  flesh  and  blood  after  years  of  miserable 
solitude.  They  have  the  freshness  of  the  day- 
light life  about  them.  You  can  hear  the 
carters  cracking  their  whips  and  crying 
hoarsely  to  their  horses  or  to  one  another ; 
and  sometimes  even  a  peal  of  healthy,  harsh 
horse-laughter  comes  up  to  you  through  the 
darkness.  There  is  now  an  end  to  mystery 
and  fear.  Like  the  knocking  at  the  door  in 
Macbeth,  or  the  cry  of  the  watchman  in  the 
64 


Tour  de  Nesh>  they  shov  that  the  horrible 
caesura  is  over,  and  the  nightmares  have  fled 
away,  because  the  day  is  breaking  and  the 
ordinary  life  of  men  is  beginning  to  bestir 
itself  among  the  streets. 

Q  HE  was  as  dead  an  old  woman  as  ever  I 
^  saw  ;  no  more  than  bone  and  parchment, 
curiously  put  together.  Her  eyes,  with  which 
she  interrogated  mine,  were  vacant  of  sense. 
It  depends  on  what  you  call  seeing,  whether 
you  might  not  call  her  blind.  Perhaps  she 
had  known  love ;  perhaps  borne  children, 
suckled  them,  and  given  them  pet  names. 
But  now  that  was  all  gone  by,  and  had  left 
her  neither  happier  nor  wiser ;  and  the  best 
she  could  do  with  her  mornings  was  to  come 
up  here  into  the  cold  church  and  juggle  for  a 
slice  of  heaven.  It  was  not  without  a  gulp 
that  I  escaped  into  the  streets  and  the  keen 
morning  air.  Morning  ?  why,  how  tired  of  it 
5he  would  be  before  night !  and  if  she  did  not 
sleep,  how  then?  It  is  fortunate  that  not 
many  of  us  are  brought  up  publicly  to  justify 
our  lives  at  the  bar  of  threescore  years  and 
ten  ;  fortunate  that  such  a  number  are  knocked 
opportunely  on  the  head  in  what  they  call  the 
flower  of  their  years,  and  go  away  to  suffer 
for  their  follies  in  private  somewhere  else. 
Otherwise,  between  sick  children  and  dis- 
contented old  folk,  we  might  be  put  out  of  all 
sonceit  of  life. 

65 


"tlTI  I  EN  I  was  going,  up  got  my  old 
stroller,  and  off  with  his  hat.  '  I  am 
afraid,'  said  he,  'that  monsieur  will  think  me 
altogether  a  beggar  ;  but  I  have  another 
demand  to  make  upon  him.'  I  began  to  hate 
him  on  the  spot.  'We  play  again  to-night,' 
he  went  on.  'Of  course  I  shall  refuse  lo 
accept  any  more  money  from  monsieur  and 
his  friends,  who  have  been  already  so  liberal. 
But  our  programme  of  to-night  is  something 
truly  creditable  ;  and  I  cling  to  the  idea  that 
monsieur  will  honour  us  with  his  presence.' 
And  then,  with  a  shrug  and  a  smile  :  '  Mon- 
sieur understands  —  the  vanity  of  an  artist  !  ' 
Save  the  mark  !  The  vanity  of  an  artist  1 
That  is  the  kind  of  thing  that  reconciles  me 
to  life  :  a  ragged,  tippling,  incompetent  old 
rogue,  with  the  manners  of  a  gentleman  and  the 
vanity  of  an  artist,  to  keep  up  his.  self-respect  ! 


went  on,  and  the  boy's  health  still 
-*•  slowly  declined.  The  Doctor  blamed 
the  weather,  which  was  cold  and  boisterous. 
lie  called  in  his  confrere  from  Burron,  took  a 
fancy  for  him,  magnified  his  capacity,  and 
was  pretty  soon  under  treatment  himself  —  it 
scarcely  appeared  for  what  complaint.  He 
and  Jean-Marie  had  each  medicine  to  take  at 
different  periods  of  the  day.  The  Doctor  used 
to  lie  in  wait  for  the  exact  moment,  watch  in 
hand.  '  There  is  nothing  like  regularity,'  he 
would  say,  fill  out  the  doses,  and  dilate  on  the 
66 


virtues  of  the  draught ;  and  if  the  boy  seemed 
none  the  better,  the  Doctor  was  not  at  all  the 
worse. 

'  T  LEAD  you,'  he  would  say,  « by  the  green 
•*•  pastures.  My  system,  my  beliefs,  my 
medicines,  are  resumed  in  one  phrase — to 
avoid  excess.  Blessed  nature,  healthy,  temper- 
ate nature,  abhors  and  exterminates  excess. 
Human  law  in  this  matter  imitates  at  a  great 
distance  her  provisions  ;  and  we  must  strive  to 
supplement  the  efforts  of  the  law.  Yes,  boy, 
we  must  be  a  law  to  ourselves  and  for  our 
neighbours  —  lex  armata  —  armed,  emphatic, 
tyrannous  law.  If  you  see  a  crapulous  human 
ruin  snuffing,  dash  from  him  his  box  !  The 
judge,  though  in  a  way  an  admission  of  disease, 
is  less  offensive  to  me  than  either  the  doctor  or 
the  priest.  Above  all,  the  doctor — the  doctor 
and  the  purulent  trash  and  garbage  of  his 
pharmacopo?ia !  Pure  air — from  the  neighbour- 
hood of  a  pinetum  for  the  sake  of  the  turpen- 
tine— unadulterated  wine,  and  the  reflections 
of  an  unsophisticated  spirit  in  the  presence  of 
the  works  of  nature — these,  my  boy,  are  the 
best  medical  appliances  and  the  best  religious 
comforts.  Devote  yourself  to  these.  Hark  ! 
there  are  the  bells  of  Bourron  (the  wind  is  in 
the  North,  it  will  be  fair).  How  clear  and  airy 
is  the  sound  !  The  nerves  are  harmonised  and 
quieted ;  the  mind  attuned  to  silence ;  and 
observe  how  easily  and  regularly  beats  the 
67 


heart !  Your  unenlightened  doctor  would  see 
nothing  in  these  sensations  ;  and  yet  you  your- 
self perceive  they  are  a  part  of  health.  Did 
you  remember  your  cinchona  this  morning? 
Good.  Cinchona  also  is  a  work  of  nature  ;  it 
is,  after  all,  only  the  bark  of  a  tree  which  we 
might  gather  for  ourselves  if  we  lived  in  the 
locality.' 

/T*HE  accepted  novelist  may  take  his  novel 
•*•  up  and  put  it  down,  spend  days  upon  it 
in  vain,  and  write  not  any  more  than  he  makes 
haste  to  blot.  Not  so  the  Beginner.  Human 
nature  has  certain  rights  ;  instinct — the  instinct 
of  self-preservation — forbids  that  any  man 
(cheered  and  supported  by  the  consciousness 
of  no  previous  victory)  should  endure  the 
miseries  of  unsuccessful  literary  toil  beyond  a 
period  to  be  measured  in  weeks.  There  must 
be  something  for  hope  to  feed  upon.  The 
beginner  must  have  a  slant  of  wind,  a  lucky 
vein  must  be  running,  he  must  be  in  one  of 
those  hours  when  the  words  come  and  the 
phrases  balance  themselves — even  to  begin. 
And  having  begun,  what  a  dread  looking 
forward  is  that  until  the  book  shall  be  accom- 
plished !  For  so  long  a  time  the  slant  is  to 
continue  unchanged,  the  vein  to  keep  running, 
for  so  long  a  time  you  must  keep  at  command 
the  same  quality  of  style :  for  so  long  a  time 
your  puppets  are  to  be  always  vital,  always 
consistent,  always  vigorous  I 
68 


« "\  1TH AT  is  this  fortunate  circumstance,  my 
*  *      friend  ? '     inquired    Anastasie,     not 
heeding    his    protest,    which    was    of    daily 
recurrence. 

'That  we  have  no  children,  my  beautiful,' 
replied  the  Doctor.  '  I  think  of  it  more  and 
more  as  the  years  go  on,  and  with  more  and 
jaore  gratitude  towards  the  Power  that  dis- 
penses such  afflictions.  Your  health,  my 
darling,  my  studious  quiet,  our  little  kitchen 
delicacies,  how  they  would  all  have  suffered, 
how  they  would  all  have  been  sacrificed  !  And 
for  what?  Children  are  the  last  word  of 
human  imperfection.  Health  flees  before  their 
face.  They  cry,  my  dear  ;  they  put  vexatious 
questions;  they  demand  to  be  fed,  to  be 
washed,  to  be  educated,  to  have  their  noses 
blowed  ;  and  then,  when  the  time  comes,  they 
break  our  hearts,  as  I  break  this  piece  of 
sugar.  A  pair  of  professed  egoists,  like  you 
and  me,  should  avoid  offspring,  like  an  in- 
fidelity.' 

'Indeed!'  said  she;  and  she  laughed. 
*  Now,  that  is  like  you — to  take  credit  for  the 
thing  you  could  not  help.' 


T  HAVE  been  made  to  learn  that  the  doom 
•*•  and  burthen  of  our  life  is  bound  for  ever 
on  man's  shoulders,  and  when  the  attempt  is 
made  to  cast  it  off,  it  but  returns  upon  us  with 
more  unfamiliar  and  more  awful  pressure. 
69 


TT^ORTH  from  the  casement,  on  the  plain 

•*•        Where  honour  has  the  world  to  gain, 

Pour  forth  and  bravely  do  your  part, 

O  knights  of  the  unshielded  heart ! 

Forth  and  for  ever  forward  ! — out 

From  prudent  turret  and  redoubt, 

And  in  the  mellay  charge  amain, 

To  fall,  but  yet  to  rise  again  ! 

Captive  ?     Ah,  still,  to  honour  bright, 

A  captive  soldier  of  the  right ! 

Or  free  and  fighting,  good  with  ill  ? 

Unconquering  but  unconauered  still  1 

/^V  TO  be  up  and  doing,  O 

^-^     Unfearing  and  unshamed  to  go 

In  all  the  uproar  and  the  press 

About  my  human  business  ! 

My  undissuaded  heart  I  hear 

Whisper  courage  in  my  ear. 

With  voiceless  calls,  the  ancient  earth 

Summons  me  to  a  daily  birth. 

"WET  it  is  to  this  very  responsibility  that  the 
•*•  rich  are  born.  They  can  shuffle  off  the 
duty  on  no  other  ;  they  are  their  own  pay- 
masters on  parole ;  and  must  pay  themselves 
fair  wages  and  no  more.  For  I  suppose  that 
in  the  course  of  ages,  and  through  reform  and 
civil  war  and  invasion,  mankind  was  pursuing 
some  other  and  more  general  design  than  to 
set  one  or  two  Englishmen  of  the  nineteenth 
century  beyond  the  reach  of  needs  and  duties. 
70 


Society  was  scarce  put  together,  and  defended 
with  so  much  eloquence  and  blood,  for  the  con- 
venience of  two  or  three  millionaires  and  a  few 
hundred  other  persons  of  wealth  and  position. 
It  is  plain  that  if  mankind  thus  acted  and 
suffered  during  all  these  generations,  they 
hoped  some  benefit,  some  ease,  some  well- 
being,  for  themselves  and  their  descendants; 
that  if  they  supported  law  and  order,  it  was  to 
secure  fair-play  for  all ;  that  if  they  denied 
themselves  in  the  present,  they  must  have  had 
some  designs  on  the  future.  Now  a  great 
hereditary  fortune  is  a  miracle  of  man's  wisdom 
and  mankind's  forbearance ;  it  has  not  only 
been  amassed  and  handed  down,  it  has  been 
suffered  to  be  amassed  and  handed  down  ;  and 
surely  in  such  consideration  as  this,  its  possessor 
should  find  only  a  new  spur  to  activity  and 
honour,  that  with  all  this  power  of  service  he 
should  not  prove  unserviceable,  and  that  this 
mass  of  treasure  should  return  in  benefits  upon 
the  race.  If  he  had  twenty,  or  thirty,  or  a 
hundred  thousand  at  his  banker's,  or  if  all 
Yorkshire  or  all  California  were  his  to  manage 
or  to  sell,  he  would  still  be  morally  penniless, 
and  have  the  world  to  begin  like  Whittington, 
until  he  had  found  some  way  of  serving  man- 
kind. His  wage  is  physically  in  his  own  hand  ; 
but,  in  honour,  that  wage  must  still  be  earned. 
He  is  only  steward  on  parole  of  what  is  called 
his  fortune.  He  must  honourably  peiform 
his  stewardship.  He  must  estimate  his  own 
71 


services  and  allow  himself  a  salary  in  pro- 
portion, for  that  will  be.  one  among  his  func- 
tions. And  while  he  will  then  be  free  to  spend 
that  salary,  great  or  little,  on  his  own  private 
pleasures,  the  rest  of  his  fortune  he  but  holds 
and  disposes  under  trust  for  mankind  ;  it  is  not 
his,  because  he  has  not  earned  it ;  it  cannot  be 
his,  because  his  services  have  already  been 
paid  ;  but  year  by  year  it  is  his  to  distribute, 
whether  to  help  individuals  whose  birthright 
and  outfit  has  been  swallowed  up  in  his,  or  to 
further  public  works  and  institutions. 

"T*IS  a  fine  thing  to  smart  for  one's  duty; 
•*•      even  in  the  pangs  of  it  there  is  con- 
tentment. 

"\ "\TE  all  suffer  ourselves  to  be  too  much 
concerned  about  a  little  poverty ;  but 
such  considerations  should  not  move  us  in  the 
choice  of  that  which  is  to  be  the  business  and 
justification  of  so  great  a  portion  of  our  lives  ; 
and  like  the  missionary,  the  patriot,  or  the 
philosopher,  we  should  all  choose  that  poor 
and  brave  career  in  which  we  can  do  the  most 
and  best  for  mankind. 

'T^IIE  salary  in  any  business  under  heaven 

•*•       is  not  the  only,   nor   indeed  the   first, 

question.     That  you  should  continue  to  exist 

is  a  matter  for  your  own  consideration  ;  but 

72 


that  your  business  should  be  first  honest,  and 
second  useful,  are  points  in  which  honour  and 
morality  are  concerned. 

'"INHERE  is  only  one  wish  realisable  on  the 
•*•  earth  ;  only  one  thing  that  can  be  per- 
fectly attained :  Death.  And  from  a  variety 
of  circumstances  we  have  no  one  to  tell  us 
whether  it  be  worth  attaining. 

A  strange  picture  we  make  on  our  way  to 
our  chimaeras,  ceaselessly  marching,  grudging 
ourselves  the  time  for  rest ;  indefatigable, 
adventurous  pioneers.  It  is  true  that  we  shall 
never  reach  the  goal ;  it  is  even  more  than 
probable  that  there  is  no  such  place  ;  and  if 
we  lived  for  centuries  and  were  endowed  with 
the  powers  of  a  god,  we  should  find  ourselves 
not  much  nearer  what  we  wanted  at  the  end. 
O  toiling  hand>  of  mortals  !  O  unweari.-d  feet, 
travelling  ye  know  not  whither  !  Soon,  soon, 
it  seems  to  you,  you  must  come  forth  on  some 
conspicuous  hilltop,  and  but  a  little  way  further, 
against  the  setting  sun,  descry  the  spires  of  El 
Dorado.  Little  do  ye  know  your  own  blessed- 
ness ;  for  to  travel  hopefully  is  a  better  thing 
than  to  arrive,  and  the  true  success  is  to  labour. 

A  MAN  who  must  separate  himself  from 
^*-  his  neighbours'  habits  in  order  to  be 
happy,  is  in  much  the  same  case  with  one  who 
requires  to  lake  opium  for  the  same  purpose. 
What  we  want  to  see  is  one  who  can  breast 
73 


into  the  world,  do  a  man's  work,  and  still  pre- 
serve his  first  and  pure  enjoyment  of  existence. 
There  is  apt  to  be  something  unmanly, 
something  almost  dastardly,  in  a  life  that  does 
not  move  with  dash  and  freedom,  and  that 
fears  the  bracing  contact  of  the  world. 

"\7"OU   cannot  run  away  from  a  weakness ; 
you    must   some   time    fight  it   out  or 
perish  7}  and  if  that  be  so,  why  not  now,  and 
where~you  stand? 

T  IFE,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  partakes  largely 
•*-*  of  the  nature  of  tragedy.  The  gospel 
according  to  Whitman,  even  if  it  be  not  so 
logical,  has  this  advantage  over  the  gospel 
according  to  ?angloss,  that  it  does  not  utterly 
disregard  the  existence  of  temporal  evil.  Whit- 
man accepts  the  fact  of  disease  and  wretched- 
ness like  an  honest  man  ;  and  instead  of  trying 
to  qualify  it  in  the  interest  of  his  optimism, 
sets  himself  to  spur  people  up  to  be  helpful. 

T  NDEED,  I  believe  this  is  the  lesson  ;  if  it 
•*•  is  for  fame  that  men  do  brave  actions, 
they  are  only  silly  fellows  after  all. 

nPO  avoid  an  occasion  for  our  virtues  is  a 
•*•  worse  degree  of  failure  than  to  push 
forward  pluckily  and  make  a  fall.  It  is  lawful 
to  pray  God  that  we  be  not  led  into  tempta- 
tion ;  but  not  lawful  to  skulk  from  those  that 
Come  to  us. 

74 


T^O  be  honest,  to  be  kind— to  earn  a  little  s 
•*•      and  to  spend  a  little  less,  to  make  upon 
the  whole  a  family  happier  for  his  presence,  to 
renounce  when  that  shall  be  necessary  and  not  . 
to  be  embittered,  to  keep  a  few  friends,  but  • 
these  without  capitulation — above  all,  on  the 
same  grim   conditions,   to   keep  friends  with 
himself— here  is  a  task  for  all  that  a  man  has  '• 
of  fortitude  and  delicacy. 

A  S  we  dwell,  we  living  things,  in  our  isle 
•^""^  of  terror  and  under  the  imminent  hand 
of  death,  God  forbid  it  should  be  man  the 
erected,  the  reasoner,  the  wise  in  his  own 
eyes — God  forbid  it  should  be  man  that 
wearies  in  welldoing,  that  despairs  of  un- 
rewarded effort,  or  utters  the  language  of 
complaint.  Let  it  be  enough  for  faith,  that 
the  whole  creation  groans  in  mortal  frailty, 
strives  with  unconquerable  constancy :  surely 
not  all  in  vain. 

T  FIND  I  never  weary  of  great  churches, 
•*•  It  is  my  favourite  kind  of  mountain 
scenery.  Mankind  was  never  so  happily  in- 
spired as  when  it  made  a  cathedral :  a  thing 
as  single  and  specious  as  a  statue  to  the  first 
glance,  and  yet,  on  examination,  as  lively  and 
interesting  as  a  forest  in  detail.  The  height 
of  spires  cannot  be  taken  by  trigonometry ; 
they  measure  absurdly  short,  but  how  tall  they 
are  to  the  admiring  eye  !  And  where  we  have 
75 


so  many  elegant  proportions,  growing  one  out 
of  the  other,  and  all  together  into  one,  it  seems 
as  if  proportion  transcended  itself  and  became 
something  different  and  more  imposing.  I 
could  never  fathom  how  a  man  dares  to  lift  up 
his  voice  to  preach  in  a  cathedral.  What  is 
he  to  say  that  will  not  be  an  anti-climax?  For 
though  I  have  heard  a  considerable  variety  of 
sermons,  I  never  yet  heard  one  that  was  so 
expressive  as  a  cathedral.  'Tis  the  best 
preacher  itself,  and  preaches  day  and  night ; 
not  only  telling  you  of  man's  art  and  aspira- 
tions in  the  past,  but  convicting  your  own  soul 
of  ardent  sympathies  ;  or  rather,  like  all  good 
preachers,  it  sets  you  preaching  to  yourself — 
and  every  man  is  his  own  doctor  of  divinity  in 
the  last  resort. 

A  S  the  business  man  comes  to  love  the  toil, 
*"*'  which  he  only  looked  upon  at  first  as  a 
ladder  towards  other  desires  and  less  unnatural 
gratifications,  so  the  dumb  man  has  felt  the 
charm  of  his  trade  and  fallen  captivated  before 
the  eyes  of  sin.  It  is  a  mistake  when  preachers 
tell  us  that  vice  is  hideous  and  loathsome  ;  for 
even  vice  has  her  Horsel  and  her  devotees, 
who  love  her  for  her  own  sake. 

T)ETWEEN  these  two,  I  now  felt  I  had  to 
•^  choose.  My  two  natures  had  memory 
in  common,  but  all  other  faculties  were  most 
unequally  shared  between  them.  Jekyll  (who 
76 


was  composite)  now  with  the  most  sensitive 
apprehensions,  now  with  a  greedy  gusto,  pro- 
jected and  shared  in  the  pleasures  and  adven- 
tures of  Hyde  ;  but  Hyde  was  indifferent  to 
Jekyll,  or  but  remembered  him  as  the  moun- 
tain bandit  remembers  the  cavern  in  which  he 
conceals  himself  from  pursuit.  Jekyll  had 
more  than  a  father's  interest ;  Hyde  had  more 
than  a  son's  indifference.  To  cast  in  my  lot 
with  Jekyll  was  to  die  to  those  appetites  which 
I  had  long  secretly  indulged,  and  had  of  late 
begun  to  pamper.  To  cast  it  in  with  Hyde 
was  to  die  to  a  thousand  interests  and  aspira- 
tions, and  to  become,  at  a  blow  and  for  ever, 
despised  and  friendless.  The  bargain  might 
appear  unequal ;  but  there  was  still  another 
consideration  in  the  scale  ;  for  while  Jekyll 
would  suffer  smartingly  in  the  fires  of  abs- 
tinence, Hyde  would  be  not  even  conscious 
of  all  that  he  had  lost.  Strange  as  my  cir- 
cumstances were,  the  terms  of  this  debate  are 
as  old  and  commonplace  as  man ;  much  the 
same  inducements  and  alarms  cast  the  die  for 
any  tempted  and  trembling  sinner  ;  and  it  fell 
out  with  me,  as  it  falls  with  so  vast  a  majority 
of  my  fellows,  that  I  chose  the  better  part,  and 
was  found  wanting  in  the  strength  to  keep  to  it. 

TV/TANY  a  man  would  have  even  blazoned 

•*•      such  irregularities  as  I  was  guilty  of; 

but  from  the  high  views  that  I  had  set  before 

me,  I  regarded  and  hid  them  with  an  almost 

7? 


morbid  sense  of  shame.  It  was  thus  rather 
the  exacting  nature  of  my  aspirations  than  any 
particular  degradation  in  my  faults  that  made 
me  what  I  was,  and,  with  even  a  deeper  trench 
than  in  the  majority  of  men,  severed  in  me 
those  provinces  of  good  and  ill  which  divide 
and  compound  man's  dual  nature.  In  this 
case  I  was  driven  to  reflect  deeply  and  in- 
veterately  on  that  hard  law  of  life,  which  lies 
at  the  root  of  religion  and  is  one  of  the  most 
plentiful  springs  of  distress.  Though  so  pro- 
found a  double  dealer,  I  was  in  no  sense  a 
hypocrite  ;  both  sides  of  me  were  in  dead 
earnest ;  I  was  no  more  myself  when  I  laid 
aside  restraint  and  plunged  in  shame,  than 
when  I  laboured,  in  the  eye  of  day,  at  the 
furtherance  of  knowledge  or  the  relief  of 
sorrow  and  suffering.  And  it  chanced  that 
the  direction  of  my  scientific  studies,  which 
led  wholly  towards  the  mystic  and  the  tran- 
scendental, reacted  and  shed  a  strong  light  on 
this  consciousness  of  the  perennial  war  among 
my  members.  With  every  day,  and  from  both 
sides  of  my  intelligence,  the  moral  and  the 
intellectual,  I  thus  drew  steadily  nearer  to 
that  truth,  by  whose  partial  discovery  I  have 
been  doomed  to  such  a  dreadful  shipwreck : 
that  man  is  not  truly  one,  but  truly  two. 

T  T  may  be  argued  again  that  dissatisfaction 
with  our  life's  endeavour  springs  in  some 
degree  from  dulness.    We  require  higher  tasks 
78 


because  we  do  not  recognise  the  height  of  those 
we  have.  Trying  to  be  kind  and  honest  seems 
an  affair  too  simple  and  too  inconsequential  for 
gentlemen  of  our  heroic  mould ;  we  had  rather 
set  ourselves  something  bold,  arduous,  and 
conclusive ;  we  had  rather  found  a  schism  or 
suppress  a  heresy,  cut  off  a  hand  or  mortify  an 
appetite.  But  the  task  before  us,  which  is  to 
co-endure  with  our  existence,  is  rather  one  of 
microscopic  fineness,  and  the  heroism  required 
is  that  of  patience.  There  is  no  cutting  of  the 
Gordian  knots  of  life  ;  each  must  be  smilingly 
unravelled. 

T  T  is  perhaps  a  more  fortunate  destiny  to 
have  a  taste  for  collecting  shells  than  to  be 
born  a  millionaire.  Although  neither  is  to  be 
despised,  it  is  always  better  policy  to  learn  an 
interest  than  to  make  a  thousand  pounds ;  for 
the  money  will  soon  be  spent,  or  perhaps  you 
may  feel  no  joy  in  spending  it;  but  the  interest 
remains  imperishable  and  ever  new.  To  be- 
come a  botanist,  a  geologist,  a  social  philo- 
sopher, an  antiquary,  or  an  artist,  is  to  enlarge 
one's  possessions  in  the  universe  by  an  in- 
calculably higher  degree,  and  by  a  far  surer 
sort  of  property,  than  to  purchase  a  farm  of 
many  acres. 

T  T  E  who  has  learned   to   love  an  art  or 

•*•  •*•     science  has  wisely  laid  up  riches  against 

the  day  of  riches  j  if  prosperity  come,  he  will 

79 


not  enter  poor  into  his  inheritance ;  he  will  not 
slumber  and  forget  himself  in  the  lap  of  money, 
or  spend  his  hours  in  counting  idle  treasures, 
but  be  up  and  briskly  doing  ;  he  will  have  the 
true  alchemic  touch,  which  is  not  that  of  Midas, 
but  which  transmutes  dead  money  into  living 
delight  and  satisfaction.  P.tre  et  pas  avoir — 
to  be,  not  to  possess — that  is  the  problem  of 
life.  To  be  wealthy,  a  rich  nature  is  the  first 
requisite  and  money  but  the  second.  To  be  of 
a  quick  and  healthy  blood,  to  share  in  all 
honourable  curiosities,  to  be  rich  in  admiration 
and  free  from  envy,  to  rejoice  greatly  in  the 
good  of  others,  to  love  with  such  generosity  of 
heart  that  your  love  is  still  a  dear  possession 
in  absence  or  unkindness — these  are  the  gifts 
of  fortune  which  money  cannot  buy,  and  with- 
out which  money  can  buy  nothing. 

A  N  aim  in  life  is  the  only  fortune  worth  the 
•*^-  finding ;  and  it  is  not  to  be  found  in 
foreign  lands,  but  in  the  heart  itself. 

'  1VT  R'  ARCHER  was  telling  me  in  some 
^•'•^  strange  land  they  used  to  run  races 
each  with  a  lighted  candle,  and  the  art  was 
to  keep  the  candle  burning.  Well,  now,  I 
thought  that  was  like  life  ;  a  man's  good  con- 
science is  the  flame  he  gets  to  carry,  and  if  he 
comes  to  the  winning-post  with  that  still  burn- 
ing, why,  take  it  how  you  will,  the  man  is  a  hero 
—even  if  he  was  low-born  like  you  and  me*1 
80 


TTOPE,  they  say,  deserts  us  at  no  period 
•*••*•  of  our  existence.  From  first  to  last, 
and  in  the  face  of  smarting  disillusions,  we 
continue  to  expect  good  fortune,  better  health, 
and  better  conduct ;  and  that  so  confidently, 
that  we  judge  it  needless  to  deserve  them. 

'  "P)O  I,  indeed,  lack  courage?'  inquired 
•*-^  Mr.  Archer  of  himself.  '  Courage,  the 
footstool  of  the  virtues,  upon  which  they  stand? 
Courage,  that  a  poor  private  carrying  a  musket 
has  to  spare  of;  that  does  not  fail  a  weasel  or 
a  rat;  that  is  a  brutish  faculty?  I  to  fail  there, 
I  wonder?  But  what  is  courage?  The  con- 
stancy to  endure  oneself  or  to  see  others  suffer? 
The  itch  of  ill-advised  activity  :  mere  shuttle- 
wittedness,  or  to  be  still  and  patient?  To 
inquire  of  the  significance  of  words  is  to  rob 
ourselves  of  what  we  seem  to  know,  and  yet, 
of  all  things,  certainly  to  stand  still  is  the  least 
heroic.' 

nrO  be  what  we  are,  and  to  become  what 
•*•       we  are  capable  of  becoming,  is  the  only 
end  of  life. 


TDUT  let  the  man  learn  to  love  a  woman  as 
•*-*  far  as  he  is  capable  of  love  ;  and  for  this 
random  affection  of  the  body  there  is  sub- 
stituted a  steady  determination,  a  consent  of 
all  his  powers  and  faculties,  which  supersedes, 
F  81 


adopts,  and  commands  the  others.  The  desire 
survives,  strengthened,  perhaps,  but  taught 
obedience,  and  changed  in  scope  and  charac- 
ter. Life  is  no  longer  a  tale  of  betrayals  and 
regrets ;  for  the  man  now  lives  as  a  whole ; 
his  consciousness  now  moves  on  uninterrupted 
like  a  river ;  through  all  the  extremes  and  ups 
and  downs  of  passion,  he  remains  approvingly 
conscious  of  himself. 

Now  to  me,  this  seems  a  type  of  that 
righteousness  which  the  soul  demands.  It 
demands  that  we  shall  not  live  alternately  with 
our  opposing  tendencies  in  continual  see-saw 
of  passion  and  disgust,  but  seek  some  path  on 
which  the  tendencies  shall  no  longer  oppose, 
but  serve  each  other  to  a  common  end.  It 
demands  that  we  shall  not  pursue  broken 
ends,  but  great  and  comprehensive  purposes, 
in  which  soul  and  body  may  unite,  like  notes 
in  a  harmonious  chord.  That  were  indeed  a 
way  of  peace  and  pleasure,  that  were  indeed 
a  heaven  upon  earth.  It  does  not  demand, 
however,  or,  to  speak  in  measure,  it  does  not 
demand  of  me,  that  I  should  starve  my  ap- 
petites for  no  purpose  under  heaven  but  as 
a  purpose  in  itself ;  or,  if  in  a  weak  despair, 
pluck  out  the  eye  that  I  have  not  learned  to 
guide  and  enjoy  with  wisdom.  The  soul  de- 
mands unity  of  purpose,  not  the  dismember- 
ment of  man ;  it  seeks  to  roll  up  all  r.is 
strength  and  sweetness,  all  his  passion  and 
wisdom,  into  one,  and  make  of  him  a  perfect 
82 


man  exulting  in  perfection.  To  conclude 
ascetically  is  to  give  up,  and  not  to  solve,  the 
problem. 

'"PHE  best  teachers  are  the  aged.  To  the 
*-  old  our  mouths  are  always  partly  closed ; 
we  must  swallow  our  obvious  retorts  and  listen. 
They  sit  above  our  heads,  on  life's  raised  dai's, 
and  appeal  at  once  to  our  respect  and  pity.  A 
flavour  of  the  old  school,  a  touch  of  something 
different  in  their  manner — which  is  freer  and 
roundei,  if  they  come  of  what  is  called  a  good 
family,  and  often  more  timid  and  precise  if 
they  are  of  the  middle  class — serves,  in  these 
days,  to  accentuate  the  difference  of  age  and 
add  a  distinction  to  grey  hairs.  But  their 
superiority  is  founded  more  deeply  than  by 
outward  marks  or  gestures.  They  are  before 
us  in  the  march  of  man ;  they  have  more  or 
less  solved  the  irking  problem ;  they  have 
battled  through  the  equinox  of  life ;  in  good 
and  evil  they  have  held  their  course ;  and  now, 
without  open  shame,  they  near  the  crown  and 
harbour.  It  may  be  we  have  been  struck 
with  one  of  fortune's  darts  ;  we  can  scarce  be 
civil,  so  cruelly  is  our  spirit  tossed.  Yet  long 
before  we  were  so  much  as  thought  upon,  the 
like  calamity  befel  the  old  man  or  woman  that 
now,  with  pleasant  humour,  rallies  us  upon 
our  inattention,  sitting  composed  in  the  holy 
evening  of  man's  life,  in  the  clear  shining  after 
rain.  We  grow  ashamed  of  our  distresses, 


new  and  hot  and  coarse,  like  villainous  road- 
side brandy  ;  we  see  life  in  aerial  perspective, 
under  the  heavens  of  faith ;  and  out  of  the 
worst,  in  the  mere  presence  of  contented 
elders,  look  forward  and  take  patience.  Fear 
shrinks  before  them  '  like  a  thing  reproved,' 
not  the  flitting  and  ineffectual  fear  of  death, 
but  the  instant,  dwelling  terror  of  the  respon- 
sibilities and  revenges  of  life.  Their  speech, 
indeed,  is  timid ;  they  report  lions  in  the 
path ;  they  counsel  a  meticulous  footing ;  but 
iheir  serene,  marred  faces  are  more  eloquent 
and  tell  another  story.  Where  they  have  gone, 
we  will  go  also,  not  very  greatly  fearing  ;  what 
they  have  endured  unbroken,  we  also,  God 
helping  us,  will  make  a  shift  to  bear. 

F  you  teach  a  man  to  keep  his  eyes  upon 
what  others  think  of  him,  unthinkingly  to 
lead  the  life  and  hold  the  principles  of  the 
majority  of  his  contemporaries,  you  must  dis- 
credit in  his  eyes  the  authoritative  voice  of  his 
own  soul.  He  may  be  a  docile  citizen  ;  he 
will  never  be  a  man.  It  is  ours,  on  the  other 
hand,  to  disregard  this  babble  and  chattering 
of  other  men  better  and  worse  than  we  are, 
and  to  walk  straight  before  us  by  what  light 
we  have.  They  may  be  right ;  but  so,  before 
heaven,  are  we.  They  may  know;  but  we 
know  also,  and  by  that  knowledge  we  must 
stand  or  fall.  There  is  such  a  thing  as  loyalty 
to  a  man's  own  better  self;  and  from  those 
84 


who  have  not  that,  God  help  me,  how  am  I 
to  look  for  loyalty  to  others  ?  The  most  dull, 
the  most  imbecile,  at  a  certain  moment  turn 
round,  at  a  certain  point  will  hear  no  further 
argument,  but  stand  unflinching  by  their  own 
dumb,  irrational  sense  of  right.  It  is  not  only 
by  steel  or  fire,  but  through  contempt  and 
blame,  that  the  martyr  fulfils  the  calling  of  his 
dear  soul.  Be  glad  if  you  are  not  tried  by 
such  extremities.  But  although  all  the  world 
ranged  themselves  in  one  line  to  tell  '  This  is 
wrong,'  be  you  your  own  faithful  vassal  and 
the  ambassador  of  God — throw  down  the  glove 
and  answer,  'This  is  right.'  Do  you  think 
you  are  only  declaring  yourself?  P  rhaps  in 
some  dim  way,  like  a  child  who  delivers  a 
message  not  fully  understood,  you  are  opening 
wider  the  straits  of  prejudice  and  preparing 
mankind  for  some  truer  and  more  spiritual 
grasp  of  truth ;  perhaps,  as  you  stand  forth 
for  your  own  judgment,  you  are  covering 
a  thousand  weak  ones  with  your  body ; 
perhaps,  by  this  declaration  alone,  you  have 
avoided  the  guilt  of  false  witness  against 
humanity  and  the  little  ones  unborn.  It  is 
good,  I  believe,  to  be  respectable,  but  much 
nobler  to  respect  oneself  and  utter  the  voice 
of  God. 

T  THINK  it  worth  noting  how  this  optimist 

•*•      was  acquainted  with  pain.     It  will  seem 

strange  only  to  the  superficial.    The  disease  oi 

85 


> 

pessimism  springs  never  from  real  troubles, 
which  it  braces  men  to  bear,  which  it  delights 
men  to  bear  well.  Nor  does  it  readily  spring 
at  all,  in  minds  that  have  conceived  of  life  as 
a  field  of  ordered  duties,  not  as  a  chase  in 
which  to  hunt  for  gratifications, 

T)  UT  the  race  of  man,  like  that  indomitable 
nature  whence  it  sprang,  has  medicating 
virtues  of  its  own ;  the  years  and  seasons 
bring  various  harvests ;  the  sun  returns  after 
the  rain ;  and  mankind  outlives  secular  ani- 
mosities, as  a  single  man  awakens  from  the 
passions  of  a  day.  We  judge  our  ancestors 
from  a  more  divine  position  ;  and  the  dust 
being  a  little  laid  with  several  centuries,  we 
can  see  both  sides  adorned  with  human  virtues 
and  fighting  with  a  show  of  right. 

T  T  is  a  commonplace  that  we  cannot  an- 
swer  for  ourselves  before  we  have  been 
tried.  But  it  is  not  so  common  a  reflection, 
and  surely  more  consoling,  that  we  usually 
find  ourselves  a  great  deal  braver  and  better 
than  we  thought.  I  believe  this  is  every  one's 
experience ;  but  an  apprehension  that  they 
may  belie  themselves  in  the  future  prevents 
mankind  from  trumpeting  this  cheerful  senti- 
ment abroad.  I  wish  sincerely,  for  it  would 
have  saved  me  much  trouble,  there  had  been 
some  one  to  put  me  in  a  good  heart  about  life 
when  I  was  younger  j  to  tell  me  how  dangers 
86 


are  most  portentous  on  a  distant  sight;  and 
how  the  good  in  a  man's  spirit  will  not  suffer 
itself  to  be  overlaid,  and  rarely  or  never  de- 
serts him  in  the  hour  of  need.  But  we  are  all 
for  tootling  on  the  sentimental  flute  in  litera- 
ture ;  and  not  a  man  among  us  will  go  to 
the  head  of  the  march  to  sound  the  heady 
drums. 

TT  is  a  poor  heart,  and  a  poorer  age,  that 
"*•  cannot  accept  the  conditions  of  life  with 
some  heroic  readiness. 

T  TOLD  him  I  was  not  much  afraid  of  such 
•••  accidents ;  and  at  any  rate  judged  it 
unwise  to  dwell  upon  alarms  or  consider  small 
perils  in  the  arrangement  of  life.  Life  itself, 
I  submitted,  was  a  far  too  risky  business  as  a 
whole  to  make  each  additional  particular  of 
danger  worth  regard. 


'TWERE  is  nothing  but  tit.  for  tat  in  this 
world,  though  sometimes  it  be  a  little 
difficult  to  trace  ;  for  the  scores  are  older  than 
we  ourselves,  and  there  has  never  yet  been  a 
settling  day  since  things  were.  You  get  enter- 
tainment pretty  much  in  proportion  as  you 
give.  As  long  as  we  were  a  sort  of  odd 
wanderers,  to  be  stared  at  and  followed  like 
a  quack  doctor  or  a  caravan,  we  had  no  want 
of  amusement  in  return  ;  but  as  soon  as  we 
8? 


sunk  into  commonplace  ourselves,  all  whon» 
we  met  were  similarly  disenchanted.  And 
here  is  one  reason  of  a  dozen  why  the  world  is 
dull  to  dull  persons. 

A  LL  literature,  from  Job  and  Omar  Khayam 
**•  to  Thomas  Cariyle  or  Walt  Whitman, 
is  but  an  attempt  to  look  upon  the  human 
state  with  such  largeness  of  view  as  shall 
enable  us  to  rise  from  the  consideration  of 
living  to  the  Definition  of  Life.  And  our 
sages  give  us  about  the  best  satisfaction  in 
their  power  when  they  say  that  it  is  a  vapour, 
or  a  show,  or  made  out  of  the  same  stuff  with 
dreams.  Philosophy,  in  its  more  rigid  sense, 
has  been  at  the  same  work  for  ages  ;  and  after 
a  myriad  bald  heads  have  wagged  over  the 
problem,  and  piles  of  words  have  been  heaped 
one  upon  another  into  dry  and  cloudy  volumes 
without  end,  philosophy  has  the  honour  of 
laying  before  us,  with  modest  pride,  her  con- 
tribution towards  the  subject :  that  life  is  a 
Permanent  Possibility  of  Sensation.  Truly  a 
fine  result  !  A  man  may  very  well  love  beef, 
or  hunting,  or  a  woman  ;  but  surely,  surely,  not 
a  Permanent  Possibility  of  Sensation !  He 
may  be  afraid  of  a  precipice,  or  a  dentist,  or  a 
large  enemy  with  a  club,  or  even  an  under- 
taker's man ;  but  not  certainly  of  abstract 
death.  We  may  trick  with  the  word  life  in 
its  dozen  senses  until  we  are  weary  of  tricking  ; 
we  may  argue  in  te  ms  of  all  the  philosophies 
S3 


on  earth,  but  one  fact  remains  true  throughout 
— that  we  do  not  love  life  in  the  sense  that  we 
are  greatly  preoccupied  about  its  conservation; 
that  we  do  not,  properly  speaking,  love  life  at 
all,  but  living. 


we  regard  life  as  a  lane 
leading  to  a  dead  wall — a  mere  bag's 
end,  as  the  French  say — or  whether  we  think 
of  it  as  a  vestibule  or  gymnasium,  where  we 
wait  our  turn  and  prepare  our  faculties  for 
some  more  noble  destiny  ;  whether  we  thunder 
in  a  pulpit,  or  pule  in  little  atheistic  poetry- 
books,  about  its  vanity  and  brevity  ;  whether 
we  look  justly  for  years  of  health  and  vigour, 
or  are  about  to  mount  into  a  bath-chair,  as  a 
step  towards  the  hearse  ;  in  each  and  all  of 
these  views  and  situations  there  is  but  one 
conclusion  possible  :  that  a  man  should  stop 
his  ears  against  paralysing  terror,  and  run  the  ' 
race  that  is  set  before  him  with  a  single  mind.j 
As  courage  and  intelligence  are  the  two 
qualities  best  worth  a  good  man's  cultivation, 
so  it  is  the  first  part  of  intelligence  to  recognise 
our  precarious  estate  in  life,  and  the  first  part 
of  courage  to  be  not  at  all  abashed  before  the 
fact.  A  frank  and  somewhat  headlong  car- 
riage, not  looking  too  anxiously  before,  not 
dallying  in  maudlin  regret  over  the  past, 
stamps  the  man  who  is  well  armoured  for  this 
world. 

89 


T  T  is  not  over  the  virtues  of  a  curate-and-tea- 
A  party  novel  that  people  are  abashed  into 
high  resolutions.  It  may  be  because  their 
hearts  are  crass,  but  to  stir  them  properly 
they  must  have  men  entering  into  glory  with 
some  pomp  and  circumstance.  And  that  is 
why  these  stories  of  our  sea-captains,  printed, 
so  to  speak,  in  capitals,  and  full  of  bracing 
moral  influence,  are  more  valuable  to  England 
than  any  material  benefit  in  all  the  books  of 
political  economy  between  Westminster  and 
Birmingham.  Greenville  chewing  wine-glasses 
at  table  makes  no  very  pleasant  figure,  any 
more  than  a  thousand  other  artists  when  they 
are  viewed  in  the  body,  or  met  in  private  life ; 
but  his  work  of  art,  his  finished  tragedy,  is  an 
elegant  performance ;  and  I  contend  it  ought 
not  only  to  enliven  men  of  the  sword  as  they 
go  into  battle,  but  send  back  merchant-clerks 
with  more  heart  and  spirit  to  their  book-keep- 
ing by  double  entry. 

IT  is  said  that  a  poet  has  died  young  in  the 
breast  of  the  most  stolid.  It  may  be 
contended,  rather,  that  this  (somewhat  minor) 
bard  in  almost  every  case  survives,  and  is  the 
spice  of  life  to  his  possessor.  Justice  is  not 
done  to  the  versatility  and  the  unplumbed 
childishness  of  man's  imagination.  His  life 
from  without  may  seem  but  a  rude  mound  of 
mud ;  there  will  be  some  golden  chamber  at 
the  heart  of  it,  in  which  he  dwells  delighted  \ 
90 


and  for  as  dark  as  his  pathway  seems  to  the 
observer,  he  will  have  some  kind  of  a  bull's- 
eye  at  his  belt, 


Tj*OR,  to  repeat,  the  ground  of  a  man's  joy 
is  often  hard  to  hit.  It  may  hinge  at 
times  upon  a  mere  accessory,  like  the  lantern ; 
it  may  reside,  like  Dancer's  in  the  mysterious 
inwards  of  psychology.  It  may  consist  with  " 
perpetual  failure,  and  find  exercise  in  the 
continued  chase.  It  has  so  little  bond  with 
externals  (such  as  the  observer  scribbles  in  his 
notebook)  that  it  may  even  touch  them  not ; 
and  the  man's  true  life,  for  which  he  consents 
to  live,  lie  altogether  in  the  field  of  fancy. 
The  clergyman  in  his  spare  hours  may  be 
winning  battles,  the  farmer  sailing  ships,  the 
banker  reaping  triumph  in  the  arts  :  all  leading 
another  life,  plying  another  trade  from  that 
they  chose  ;  like  the  poet's  house-builder,  who, 
after  all,  is  cased  in  stone, 

'  By  his  fireside,  as  impotent  fancy  prompts, 
Rebuilds  it  to  his  liking. ' 

In  such  a  case  the  poetry  runs  underground. 
The  observer  (poor  soul,  with  his  documents  !) 
is  all  abroad.  For  to  look  at  the  man  is  but 
to  court  deception.  We  shall  see  the  trunk 
from  which  he  draws  his  nourishment  ;  but  he 
himself  is  above  and  abroad  in  the  green  dome 
of  foliage,  hummed  through  by  winds  and 
91 


nested  in  by  nightingales.  And  the  true 
realism  were  that  of  the  poets,  to  climb  up 
after  him  like  a  squirrel,  and  catch  some 
glimpse  of  the  heaven  for  which  he  lives. 
And  the  true  realism,  always  and  everywhere, 
is  that  of  the  poets :  to  find  out  where  joy 
resides,  and  give  it  voice  beyond  singing. 


T  T  E  who  shall  pass  judgment  on  the  records 
•*••*•  of  our  life  is  the  same  that  formed  us  in 
frailty. 


are  all  so  busy,  and  have  so  many  far- 
off  projects  to  realise,  and  castles  in  the 
fire  to  turn  into  solid  habitable  mansions  on 
a  gravel  soil,  that  we  can  find  no  time  for 
pleasure  trips  into  the  Land  of  Thought  and 
among  the  Hills  of  Vanity.  Changed  times, 
indeed,  when  we  must  sit  all  night,  beside  the 
fire,  with  folded  hands  ;  and  a  changed  world 
for  most  of  us,  when  we  find  we  can  pass  the 
hours  without  discontent,  and  be  happy  think- 
ing. We  are  in  such  haste  to  be  doing,  to  be 
writing,  to  be  gathering  gear,  to  make  our 
voice  audible  a  moment  in  the  derisive  silence 
of  eternity,  that  we  forget  that  one  thing,  of 
which  these  are  but  the  parts — namely,  to  live. 
We  fall  in  love,  we  drink  hard,  we  run  to  and 
fro  upon  the  earth  like  frightened  sheep.  And 
now  you  are  to  ask  yourself  if,  when  all  is 
done,  you  would  not  have  been  better  to  sit  by 
93 


the  fire  at  home,  and  be  happy  thinking.  To 
sit  still  and  contemplate — to  remember  the 
faces  of  women  without  desire,  to  be  pleased 
by  the  great  deeds  of  men  without  envy,  to  be 
everything  and  everywhere  in  sympathy,  and 
yet  content  to  remain  where  and  what  you  are 
— is  not  this  to  know  both  wisdom  and  virtue, 
and  to  dwell  with  happiness  ? 

OF  those  who  fail,  I  do  not  speak — despair 
should   be  sacred ;    but  to   those  who 
even  modestly  succeed,  the  changes  of  their 
fe   bring  interest  :    a  job   found,  a  shilling 
saved,  a  dainty  earned,  all  these  are  wells  of 
pleasure    springing    afresh  for   the   successful 
poor ;  and  it  is  not  from  these,  but  from  the 
villa-dweller,  that  we  hear  complaints  of  the 
unworthiness  of  life. 

T  SHALL  be  reminded  what  a  tragedy  of 
•*•  misconception  and  misconduct  man  at 
large  presents  :  of  organised  injustice,  cowardly 
violence  and  treacherous  crime;  and  of  the 
damning  imperfections  of  the  best.  They 
cannot  be  too  darkly  drawn.  Man  is  indeed 
marked  for  failure  in  his  efforts  to  do  right. 
But  where  the  best  consistently  miscarry,  how 
tenfold  more  remarkable  that  all  should  con- 
tinue to  strive ;  and  surely  we  should  find  it 
both  touching  and  inspiriting,  that  in  a  field 
from  which  success  is  banished,  our  race  should 
not  cease  to  labour. 

93 


"DOOR  soul,  here  for  so  little,  cast  among  so 
•*•  many  hardships,  filled  with  desires  so 
incommensurate  and  so  inconsistent,  savagely 
surrounded,  savagely  descended,  irremediably 
condemned  to  prey  upon  his  fellow  lives  :  who 
should  have  blamed  him  had  he  been  of  a 
piece  with  his  destiny  and  a  being  merely 
barbarous?  And  we  look  and  behold  him 
instead  filled  with  imperfect  virtues  :  infinitely 
childish,  often  admirably  valiant,  often  touch- 
ingly  kind  ;  sitting  down  amidst  his  momentary 
life,  to  debate  of  right  and  wrong  and  the 
attributes  of  the  deity  ;  rising  up  to  do  battle 
for  an  egg  or  die  for  an  idea  ;  singling  out  his 
friends  and  his  mate  with  cordial  affection  ; 
bringing  forth  in  pain,  rearing,  with  long- 
suffering  solicitude,  his  young.  To  touch  the 
heart  of  his  mystery,  we  find  in  him  one 
thought,  strange  to  the  point  of  lunacy  :  the 
thought  of  duty,  the  thought  of  something 
owing  to  himself,  to  his  neighbour,  to  his 
God :  an  ideal  of  decency,  to  which  he  would 
rise  if  it  were  possible ;  a  limit  of  shame, 
below  which,  if  it  be  possible,  he  will  not 
stoop. 


/T*HERE  are  two  just  reasons  for  the  choice 
•*•       of  any  way  of  life  :   the  first  is  inbred 
taste  in  the  chooser ;  the  second  some  high 
utility  in  the  industry  selected. 


94 


'T^HERE  is  an  idea  abroad  among  moral 
•*•  people  that  they  should  make  their 
neighbours  good.  One  person  I  have  to  make 
good  :  myself.  But  my  duty  to  my  neighbour 
is  much  more  nearly  expressed  by  saying  that 
I  have  to  make  him  happy — if  I  may. 


/ 


T  N  his  own  life,  then,  a  man  is  not  to  expect 
happiness,  only  to  profit  by  it  gladly  when 
it  shall  arise  ;  he  is  on  duty  here ;  he  knows 
not  how  or  why,  and  does  not  need  to  know  ; 
he  knows  not  for  what  hire,  and  must  not  ask. 
Somehow  or  other,  though  he  does  not  know 
what  goodness  is,  he  must  try  to  be  good  ; 
somehow  or  other,  though  he  cannot  tell  what 
will  do  it,  he  must  try  to  give  happiness  to 
others. 


/"""VF  this  one  thing  I  am  sure  :  that  every  one 
^^  thawed  and  became  more  humanised 
and  conversible  as  soon  as  these  innocent 
people  appeared  upon  the  scene.  I  would  not 
readily  trust  the  travelling  merchant  with  any 
extravagant  sum  of  money,  but  I  am  sure  his 
heart  was  in  the  right  place. 

In  this  mixed  world,  if  you  can  find  one  or 
two  sensible  places  in  a  man  ;  above  all,  if  you 
should  find  a  whole  family  living  together  on 
such  pleasant  terms,  you  may  surely  be  satis- 
fied, and  take  the  rest  for  granted ;  or,  what 
is  a  great  deal  better,  boldly  make  up  your 
95 


mind  that  you  can  do  perfectly  well  without 
the  rest,  and  that  ten  thousand  bad  traits  can- 
not make  a  single  good  one  any  the  less  good. 

T_T  IS  was,  indeed,  a  good  influence  in  life 
while  he  was  still  among  us  ;  he  had  a 
fresh  laugh  ;  it  did  you  good  to  see  him ;  and, 
however  sad  he  may  have  been  at  heart,  he 
always  bore  a  bold  and  cheerful  countenance 
and  took  fortune's  worst  as  it  were  the  showers 
of  spring. 

"PLEASURES  are  more  beneficial  than 
A  duties  because,  like  the  quality  of  mercy, 
they  are  not  strained,  and  they  are  twice  blest. 
There  must  always  be  two  to  a  kiss,  and  there 
may  be  a  score  in  a  jest ;  but  wherever  there 
is  an  element  of  sacrifice,  the  favour  is  con- 
ferred with  pain,  and,  among  generous  people, 
received  with  confusion. 

There  is  no  duty  we  so  much  underrate  as 
.the  duty  of  being  happy-  By  being  happy, 
we  sow  anonymous  benefits  upon  the  world, 
which  remain  unknown  even  to  ourselves,  or 
when  they  are  disclosed,  surprise  nobody  so 
much  as  the  benefactor 

A  HAPPY  man  or  woman  is  a  better  thing 
•**•  to  find  than  a  five-pound  note.  He  or 
she  is  a  radiating  focus  of  goodwill  ;  and  their 
entrance  into  a  room  is  as  though  another 
candle  had  been  lighted.  We  need  not  care 
96 


whether  they  could  prove  the  forty-seventh 
proposition  ;  they  do  a  better  thing  than  that, 
they  practically  demonstrate  the  great  Theorem 
of  the  Liveableness  of  Life. 

MME.  B  AZIN  came  out  after  a  while  j  she 
was  tired  with  her  day's  work,  I  sup- 
pose ;  and  she  nestled  up  to  her  husband  and 
laid  her  head  upon  his  breast.  He  had  his 
arm  about  her  and  kept  gently  patting  her  on 
the  shoulder.  I  think  Bazin  was  right,  and  he 
was  really  married.  Of  how  few  people  can 
the  same  be  said  ! 

Little  did  the  Bazins  know  how  much  they 
served  us.  We  were  charged  for  candles,  for 
food  and  drink,  and  for  the  beds  we  slept  in. 
But  there  was  nothing  in  the  billfor  the  husband's 
pleasant  talk ;  nor  for  the  pretty  spectacle  of 
their  married  life.  And  there  was  yet  another 
item  uncharged.  For  these  people's  politeness 
really  set  us  up  again  in  our  own  esteem. 
We  had  a  thirst  for  consideration ;  the  sense  of 
insult  was  still  hot  in  our  spirits ;  and  civil  usage 
seemed  to  restore  us  to  our  position  in  the  world. 
How  little  we  pay  our  way  in  life  !  Although 
we  have  our  purses  continually  in  our  hand, 
the  better  part  of  service  goes  still  unrewarded. 
But  I  like  to  fancy  that  a  grateful  spirit  gives 
as  good  as  it  gets.  Perhaps  the  Bazins  knew 
how  much  I  liked  them  ?  perhaps  they,  also, 
were  healed  of  some  slights  by  the  thanks  that 
I  gave  them  in  my  manner  ? 
G  97 


"M"O  art,  it  may  be  said,  was  ever  perfect, 
•*•  ^  and  not  many  noble,  that  has  not  been 
mirthfully  conceived.  And  no  man,  it  may  be 
added,  was  ever  anything  but  a  wet  blanket 
and  a  cross  to  his  companions  who  boasted  not 
a  copious  spirit  of  enjoyment. 


is  yet  another  class  who  do  not 
••  depend  on  corporal  advantages,  but 
support  the  winter  in  virtue  of  a  brave  and 
merry  heart.  One  shivering  evening,  cold 
enough  for  frost,  but  with  too  high  a  wind,  and 
a  little  past  sundown,  when  the  lamps  were 
beginning  to  en-large  their  circles  in  the  grow- 
ing dusk,  a  brace  of  barefooted  lassies  were 
seen  coming  eastward  in  the  teeth  of  the  wind. 
If  the  one  was  as  much  as  nine,  the  other  was 
certainly  not  more  than  seven.  They  were 
miserably  clad  ;  and  the  pavement  was  so 
cold,  you  would  have  thought  no  one  could 
lay  a  naked  foot  on  it  unflinching.  Yet  they 
came  along  waltzing,  if  you  please,  while  the 
elder  sang  a  tune  to  give  them  music.  The 
person  who  saw  this,  and  whose  heart  was 
full  of  bitterness  at  the  moment,  pocketed  a 
reproof  which  has  been  of  use  to  him  ever 
since,  and  which  he  now  hands  on,  with  his 
good  wishes,  to  the  reader. 

TTAPPINESS,  at  least,  is  not  solitary;  it 

•*•  •*•     joys  to  communicate  ;   it  loves  others, 

for  it  depends  on  them  for  its  existence  ;  it 

98 


sanctions  and  encourages  to  all  delights  that 
are  not  unkind  in  themselves ;  if  it  lived  to  a 
thousand,  it  would  not  make  excision  of  a 
single  humorous  passage ;  and  while  the  self- 
improver  dwindles  toward  the  prig,  and,  if  he 
be  not  of  an  excellent  constitution,  may  even 
grow  deformed  into  an  Obermann,  the  very 
name  and  appearance  of  a  happy  man  breathe 
of  good -nature,  and  help  the  rest  of  us  to  live. 

T  T  is  never  a  thankful  office  to  offer  advice  ; 
•*•  and  advice  is  the  more  unpalatable,  not 
only  from  the  difficulty  of  the  service  recom- 
mended, but  often  from  its  very  obviousness. 
We  are  fired  with  anger  against  those  who  make 
themselves  the  spokesmen  of  plain  obligations ; 
for  they  seem  to  insult  us  as  they  advise. 

"\X7"E  are  not  all  patient  Grizzels,  by  good 
**       fortune,   but   the   most   of  us   human 
beings  with  feelings  and  tempers  of  our  own. 

TV/I"  EN,  whether  lay  or  clerical,  suffer  better 
^  the  flame  of  the  stake  than  a  daily 

inconvenience  or  a  pointed  sneer,  and  will  not 
readily  be  martyred  without  some  external 
circumstance  and  a  concourse  looking  on. 

A  N  imperturbable  demeanour  comes  from 
•^7-  perfect  patience.  Quiet  minds  cannot 
be  perplexed  or  frightened,  but  go  on  in  fortune 
or  misfortune  at  their  own  private  pace,  like  a 
clock  during  a  thunderstorm. 
99 


'T'HE  ways  of  men  seem  always  very  trivial 
to  us  when  we  find  ourselves  alone  on  a 
thurch  top,  with  the  blue  sky  and  a  few  tall 
pinnacles,  and  see  far  below  us  the  steep  roofs 
and  foreshortened  buttresses,  and  the  silent 
activity  of  the  city  streets. 

XT  EVERTHELESS,  there  is  a  certain  frame 
•*•  ^  of  mind  to  which  a  cemetery  is,  if  not 
an  antidote,  at  least  an  alleviation.  If  you  are 
in  a  fit  of  the  blues,  go  nowhere  else. 

T  CAN  excuse  a  person  combating  my  religi- 
•*•  ous  or  philosophical  heresies,  because  them 
I  have  deliberately  accepted,  and  am  ready  to 
justify  by  present  argument.  But  I  do  not 
seek  to  justify  my  pleasures. 

TTONOUR  can  survive  a  wound;  it  can 
live  and  thrive  without  member.  The 
man  rebounds  from  his  disgrace ;  he  begins 
fresh  foundations  on  the  ruins  of  the  old  ;  and 
when  his  sword  is  broken,  he  will  do  valiantly 
with  his  dagger. 

T  T  is  easy  to  be  virtuous  when  one's  own 
•*•  convenience  is  not  affected  ;  and  it  is  no 
shame  to  any  man  to  follow  the  advice  of  an 
outsider  who  owns  that,  while  he  sees  which  is 
the  better  part,  he  might  not  have  the  courage 
to  profit  himself  by  this  opinion. 
100 


A  S  soon  as  prudence  has  begun  to  grow  up 
J-*-  in  the  brain,  like  a  dismal  fungus,  it 
finds  its  expression  in  a  paralysis  of  generous 
acts. 

n^HE  man  who  cannot  forgive  any  mortal 

•*•       thing  is  a  green  hand  in  life. 

T  T  is  a  useful  accomplishment  to  be  able  to 
say  no,  but  surely  it  is  the  essence  of  ami- 
ability to  prefer  to  say  yes  where  it  is  possible. 
There  is  something  wanting  in  the  man  who 
does  not  hate  himself  whenever  he  is  con- 
strained to  say  no.  And  ther/»  vi**  n  great 
deal  wanting  in  this  born  dissenter.  He  was 
almost  shockingly  devoid  of  weaknesses  ;  he 
had  not  enough  of  them  to  be  truly  polar  with 
humanity ;  whether  you  call  him  demi-god  or 
demi-man,  he  was  at  least  not  altogether  one 
of  us,  for  he  was  not  touched  with  a  feeling  of 
our  infirmities.  The  world's  heroes  have  room 
for  all  positive  qualities,  even  those  which  are 
disreputable,  in  the  capacious  theatre  of  their 
dispositions.  Such  can  live  many  lives  ;  while 
a  Thoreau  can  live  but  one,  and  that  only  with 
perpetual  foresight. 

"\17E  can  all  be  angry  with  our  neighbour; 
what  we  want  is  to  be  shown,  not  his 
defects,  of  which  we  are  too  conscious,  but 
his  merits,  to  which  we  are  too  blind. 
XOI 


A  ND  methought  that  beauty  and  terror  are 
**•    only  one,  not  two  ; 
And  the  world  has  room  for  love,  and  death, 

and  thunder,  and  dew  ; 
And  all  the  sinews  of  hell  slumber  in  summer 

air; 
And  the  face  of  God  is  a  rock,  but  the  face  of 

the  rock  is  fair. 
Beneficent  streams  of  tears  flow  at  the  finger 

of  pain ; 
And  out  of  the  cloud  that  smites,  beneficent 

rivers  of  rain. 

/T*IIE  longest  and  most  abstruse  flight  of  a 
•*•  philosopher  becomes  clear  and  shallow, 
in  the  flash  of  a  moment,  when  we  suddenly 
perceive  the  aspect  and  drift  of  his  intention. 
The  longest  argument  is  but  a  finger  pointed  ; 
once  we  get  our  own  finger  rightly  parallel, 
and  we  see  what  the  man  meant,  whether  it 
be  a  new  star  or  an  old  street-lamp.  And 
briefly,  if  a  saying  is  hard  to  understand,  it  is 
because  we  are  thinking  of  something  else. 

I  HAVE  seen  wicked  men  and  fools,  a  great 
many  of  both  ;  and  I  believe  they  both 
get  paid  in  the  end,  but  the  fools  first. 

T17HETHER    people's    gratitude   for   the 

*  *      good  gifts  that  come  to  them  be  wisely 

conceived  or  dutifully  expressed  is  a  secondary 

matter,  after  all,  so  long  as  they  feel  gratitude. 

102 


The  true  ignorance  is  when  a  man  does  not 
know  that  he  has  received  a  good  gift,  or 
begins  to  imagine  that  he  has  got  it  for  him- 
self. The  self-made  man  is  the  funniest  wind- 
bag after  all !  There  is  a  marked  difference 
between  decreeing  light  in  chaos,  and  lighting 
the  gas  in  a  metropolitan  back  parlour  with  a 
box  of  patent  matches  ;  and,  do  what  we  will, 
there  is  always  something  made  to  our  hand, 
if  it  were  only  our  fingers. 

•DENJAMIN  FRANKLIN  went  through 
life  an  altered  man,  because  he  once 
paid  too  dearly  for  a  penny  whistle.  My  con- 
cern springs  usually  from  a  deeper  source,  to 
wit,  from  having  bought  a  whistle  when  I  did 
not  want  one. 

T  BELIEVE  in  a  better  state  of  things,  that 
•••  there  will  be  no  more  nurses,  and  that 
every  mother  will  nurse  her  own  offspring ; 
for  what  can  be  more  hardening  and  demoral- 
ising than  to  call  forth  the  tenderest  feelings 
of  a  woman's  heart  and  cherish  them  yourself 
as  long  as  you  need  them,  as  long  as  your 
children  require  a  nurse  to  love  them,  and 
then  to  blight  and  thwart  and  destroy  them, 
whenever  your  own  use  for  them  is  at  an  end. 

"\1TE  had  needs  invent  heaven  if  it  had  not 
been  revealed  to  us ;  there  are  some 
things  that  fall  so  bitterly  ill  on  this  side  time  I 
103 


HTO  write  with  authority  about  another  man, 
A  we  must  have  fellow-feeling  and  some 
common  ground  of  experience  with  our  sub- 
ject. We  may  praise  or  blame  according  as 
we  find  him  related  to  us  by  the  best  or  worst 
in  ourselves ;  but  it  is  only  in  virtue  of  some 
relationship  that  we  can  be  his  judges,  even  to 
condemn.  Feelings  which  we  share  and  under- 
stand enter  for  us  into  the  tissue  of  the  man's 
character ;  those  to  which  we  are  strangers  in 
our  own  experience  we  are  inclined  to  regard 
as  blots,  exceptions,  inconsistencies,  and  ex- 
cursions of  the  diabolic ;  we  conceive  them 
with  repugnance,  explain  them  with  difficulty, 
and  raise  our  hands  to  heaven  in  wonder  when 
we  find  them  in  conjunction  with  talents  that 
we  respect  or  virtues  that  we  admire. 

rT*O  the  best  of  my  belief,  Mr.  Shandy  is  the 
•*•  first  who  fairly  pointed  out  the  incalcul- 
able influence  of  nomenclature  upon  the  whole 
life — who  seems  first  to  have  recognised  the 
one  child,  happy  in  an  heroic  appellation, 
soaring  upwards  on  the  wings  of  fortune,  and 
the  other,  like  the  dead  sailor  in  his  shotted 
hammock,  haled  down  by  sheer  weight  of 
name  into  the  abysses  of  social  failure. 

T  T  would  be  well  if  nations  and  races  could 
-*•      communicate  their  qualities  ;  but  in  prac- 
tice when  they  look   upon  each   other,   they 
have  an  eye  to  nothing  but  defects. 
104 


TV/T  ANY  a  man's  destiny  has  been  settled  by 
•*•*•*•  nothing  apparently  more  grave  than  a 
pretty  face  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  street 
and  a  couple  of  bad  companions  round  the 
corner. 

C  O  kindly  is  the  world  arranged,  such  great 
^  profit  may  arise  from  a  small  degree  of 
human  reliance  on  oneself,  and  such,  in  par- 
ticular, is  the  happy  star  of  this  trade  of  writing, 
that  it  should  combine  pleasure  and  profit  to 
both  parties,  and  be  at  once  agreeable,  like 
fiddling,  and  useful,  like  good  preaching. 

T  N  all  garrison  towns,  guard-calls,  and  re- 
•*•  veilles,  and  such  like,  make  a  fine, 
romantic  interlude  in  civic  business.  Bugles, 
and  drums,  and  fifes  are  of  themselves  most 
excellent  things  in  nature,  and  when  they 
carry  the  mind  to  marching  armies  and  the 
picturesque  vicissitudes  of  war  they  stir  up 
something  proud  in  the  heart. 

'T*O  pass  from  hearing  literature  to  reading 
it  is  to  take  a  great  and  dangerous  step. 
With  not  a  few,  I  think  a  large  proportion  of 
their  pleasure  then  comes  to  an  end ;  '  the 
malady  of  not  marking  '  overtakes  them  ;  they 
read  thenceforward  by  the  eye  alone  and  hear 
never  again  the  chime  of  fair  words  or  the 
march  of  the  stately  period.  Non  ragioniam 
of  these.  But  to  all  the  step  is  dangerous ;  it 
105 


involves  coming  of  age ;  it  is  even  a  kind  of 
second  weaning.  In  the  past  all  was  at  the 
choice  of  others ;  they  chose,  they  digested, 
they  read  aloud  for  us  and  sang  to  their  own 
tune  the  books  of  childhood.  In  the  future 
we  are  to  approach  the  silent,  inexpressive 
type  alone,  like  pioneers ;  and  the  choice  of 
what  we  are  to  read  is  in  our  own  hands 
thenceforward. 

T  T  remains  to  be  seen  whether  you  car.  prove 
•*•  yourselves  as  generous  as  you  have  been 
wise  and  patient 

1 T  F  folk  dinna  ken  what  ye 're  doing,  Davie, 
•*•      they  're  terrible  taken  up  with  it ;  but  if 
they  think  they  ken,  they  care  nae  mair  for  it 
than  what  I  do  for  pease  porridge.' 

A  ND  perhaps  if  you  could  read  in  my  soul, 
•**•  or  I  could  read  in  yours,  our  own  com- 
posure might  seem  little  less  surprising. 

TpOR  charity  begins  blindfold;  and  only 
•*•  through  a  series  of  similar  misapprehen- 
sions rises  at  length  into  a  settled  principle  of 
love  and  patience,  and  a  firm  belief  in  all  our 
fellow-men. 

HTHERE  is  no  doubt  that  the  poorer  classes 

•*•       in  our  country  are  much  more  charitably 

Disposed  than  their  superiors  in  wealth.     And 


I  fancy  it  must  arise  a  great  deal  from  the 
comparative  indistinction  of  the  easy  and  the 
not  so  easy  in  these  ranks.  A  workman  or  a 
pedlar  cannot  shutter  himself  off  from  his  less 
comfortable  neighbours.  If  he  treats  himself 
to  a  luxury,  he  must  do  it  in  the  face  of  a  dozen 
who  cannot.  And  what  should  more  directly 
lead  to  charitable  thoughts?  Thus  the  poor 
man,  camping  out  in  life,  sees  it  as  it  is,  and 
knows  that  every  mouthful  he  puts  in  his  belly 
has  been  wrenched  out  of  the  fingers  of  the 
hungry. 

But  at  a  certain  stage  of  prosperity,  as  in  a 
balloon  ascent,  the  fortunate  person  passes 
through  a  zone  of  clouds,  and  sublunary  matters 
are  thenceforward  hidden  from  his  view.  He 
sees  nothing  but  the  heavenly  bodies,  all  in 
admirable  order,  and  positively  as  good  as  new. 
He  finds  himself  surrounded  in  the  most  touch- 
ing manner  by  the  attentions  of  Providence, 
and  compares  himself  involuntarily  with  the 
lilies  and  the  skylarks.  He  does  not  precisely 
sing,  of  course;  but  then  he  looks  so  unassum- 
ing in  his  open  laudau  !  If  all  the  world  dined 
at  one  table,  this  philosophy  would  meet  with 
some  rude  knocks. 

FORGIVE  me,  if  I  seem  to  teach,  who  am 
as  ignorant  as  the  trees  of  the  mountain ; 
but  those  who  learn  much  do  but  skim  the 
face  of  knowledge  ;  they  seize  the  laws,  they 
conceive  the  dignity  of  the  design — the  horror 
107 


of  the  living  fact  fades  from  the  memory.  It 
is  we  who  sit  at  home  with  evil  who  remember, 
I  think,  and  are  warned  and  pity. 

T  OOK  back  now,  for  a  moment,  on  your 
•*-*  own  brief  experience  of  life  ;  and  al- 
though you  lived  it  feelingly  in  your  own 
person,  and  had  every  step  of  conduct  burned 
in  by  pains  and  joys  upon  your  memory,  tell 
me  what  definite  lesson  does  experience  hand 
on  from  youth  to  manhood,  or  from  both  to 
age?  The  settled  tenor  which  first  strikes  the 
eye  is  but  the  shadow  of  a  delusion.  This  is 
gone  ;  that  never  truly  was  ;  and  you  yourself 
are  altered  beyond  recognition.  Times  and 
men  and  circumstances  change  about  your 
changing  character,  with  a  speed  of  which  no 
earthly  hurricane  affords  an  image.  What 
was  the  best  yesterday,  is  it  still  the  best  in 
this  changed  theatre  of  a  to-morrow?  Will 
your  own  Past  truly  guide  you  in  your  own 
violent  and  unexpected  Future?  And  if  this 
be  questionable,  with  what  humble,  with  what 
hopeless  eyes,  should  we  not  watch  other  men 
driving  beside  us  on  their  unknown  careers, 
seeing  with  unlike  eyes,  impelled  by  different 
gales,  doing  and  suffering  in  another  sphere  of 
things  ? 

*T*HE  problem  of  education  is  twofold:  first 

•*•       to  know,  and  then  to  utter.     Every  one 

Who  lives  any  semblance  of  an  inner  life  thinks 

108 


more  nobly  and  profoundly  than  he  speaks ; 
and  the  best  teachers  can  impart  only  broken 
images  of  the  truth  which  they  perceive. 
Speech  which  goes  from  one  to  another  be- 
tween two  natures,  and,  what  is  worse,  between 
(wo  experiences,  is  doubly  relative.  The 
speaker  buries  his  meaning;  it  is  for  the  hearer 
to  dig  it  up  again  ;  and  all  speech,  written  or 
spoken,  is  in  a  dead  language  until  it  finds  a 
willing  and  prepared  hearer. 

f~~*  ULTURE  is  not  measured  by  the  greatness 
^*  of  the  field  which  is  covered  by  our  know- 
ledge, but  by  the  nicety  with  which  we  can 
perceive  relations  in  that  field,  whether  great 
or  small. 

"Xl^E  are  accustomed  nowadays  to  a  great 
deal  of  puling  over  the  circumstances 
in  which  we  are  placed.  The  great  refinement 
of  many  poetical  gentlemen  has  rendered  them 
practically  unfit  for  the  jostling  and  ugliness 
of  life,  and  they  record  their  unfitness  at 
considerable  length.  The  bold  and  awful 
poetry  of  Job's  complaint  produces  too  many 
flimsy  imitators ;  for  there  is  always  something 
consolatory  in  grandeur,  but  the  symphony 
transposed  for  the  piano  becomes  hysterically 
sad.  This  literature  of  woe,  as  Whitman  calls 
it,  this  Maladie  de  Rent,  as  we  like  to  call  it 
in  Europe,  is  in  many  ways  a  most  humiliating 
and  sickly  phenomenon.  Young  gentlemen 
109 


with  three  or  four  hundred  a  year  of  private 
means  look  down  from  a  pinnacle  of  doleful 
experience  on  all  the  grown  and  hearty  men 
who  have  dared  to  say  a  good  word  for  life 
since  the  beginning  of  the  world.  There  is 
no  prophet  but  the  melancholy  Jacques,  and 
the  blue  devils  dance  on  all  our  literary  wires. 
It  would  be  a  poor  service  to  spread  culture, 
if  this  be  its  result,  among  the  comparatively 
innocent  and  cheerful  ranks  of  men.  When 
our  little  poets  have  to  be  sent  to  look  at  the 
ploughman  and  learn  wisdom,  we  must  be 
careful  how  we  tamper  with  our  ploughmen. 
Where  a  man  in  not  the  best  of  circumstances 
preserves  composure  of  mind,  and  relishes  ale 
and  tobacco,  and  his  wife  and  children,  in  the 
intervals  of  dull  and  unremunerative  labour; 
where  a  man  in  this  predicament  can  afford  a 
lesson  by  the  way  to  what  are  called  his 
intellectual  superiors,  there  is  plainly  some- 
thing to  be  lost,  as  well  as  something  to  be 
gained,  by  teaching  him  to  think  differently. 
It  is  better  to  leave  him  as  he  is  than  to  teach 
him  whining.  It  is  better  that  he  should  go 
without  the  cheerful  lights  of  culture,  if  cheer- 
less doubt  and  paralysing  sentimentalism  are  to 
be  the  consequence.  Let  us,  by  all  means, 
fight  against  that  hide-bound  stolidity  of 
sensation  and  sluggishness  of  mind  which 
blurs  and  decolorises  for  poor  natures  the 
wonderful  pageant  of  consciousness ;  let  us 
teach  people,  as  much  g.s  we  can,  to  enjoy, 
no 


and  they  will  learn  for  themselves  to  sym- 
pathise ;  but  let  us  see  to  it,  above  all,  that 
we  give  these  lessons  in  a  brave,  vivacious 
note,  and  build  the  man  up  in  courage  while 
we  demolish  its  substitute,  indifference. 

A  LL  opinions,  properly  so  called,  are  stages 
•**•  on  the  road  to  truth.  It  does  not  follow 
that  a  man  will  travel  any  further  ;  but  if  he 
has  really  considered  the  world  and  drawn  a 
conclusion,  he  has  travelled  so  far.  This  does 
not  apply  to  formulae  got  by  rote,  which  are 
stages  on  the  road  to  nowhere  but  second 
childhood  and  the  grave.  To  have  a  catch- 
word in  your  mouth  is  not  the  same  thing  as 
to  hold  an  opinion ;  still  less  is  it  the  same 
thing  as  to  have  made  one  for  yourself. 

T  T  is  surely  beyond  a  doubt  that  people 
•*•  should  be  a  good  deal  idle  in  youth.  For 
though  here  and  there  a  Lord  Macaulay  may 
escape  from  school  honours  with  all  his  wits 
about  him,  most  boys  pay  so  dear  for  their 
medals  that  they  never  afterwards  have  a  shot 
in  their  locker,  and  begin  the  world  bankrupt. 
And  the  same  holds  true  during  all  the  time  a 
lad  is  educating  himself,  or  suffering  others  to 
educate  him.  .  .  .  Books  are  good  enough  in 
their  own  way,  but  they  are  a  mighty  bloodless 
substitute  for  Jife*  It  seems  a  pity  to  sit,  like 
the  Lady  of  Shalott,  peering  into  a  mirror, 
with  your  back  turned  on  all  the  bustle  and 
i  ii 


glamour  of  reality.  And  if  a  man  reads  very 
hard,  as  the  old  anecdote  reminds  us,  he  will 
have  little  time  for  thought. 

T  T  is  supposed  that  all  knowledge  is  at  the 
•*•  bottom  of  a  well,  or  the  far  end  of  a 

telescope.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  an  intelligent 
person,  looking  out  of  his  eyes  and  hearkening 
in  his  ears,  with  a  smile  on  his  face  all  the 
time,  will  get  more  true  education  than  many 
another  in  a  life  of  heroic  vigils.  There  is 
certainly  some  chill  and  arid  knowledge  to  be 
found  upon  the  summits  of  formal  and  laborious 
science  ;  but  it  is  all  round  about  you,  and  for 
the  trouble  of  looking,  that  you  will  acquire 
the  warm  and  palpitating  facts  of  life.  \Vhile 
others  are  filling  their  memory  with  a  lumber 
of  words,  one-half  of  which  they  will  forget 
before  the  week  is  out,  your  truant  may  learn 
some  really  useful  art :  to  play  the  fiddle,  or 
to  speak  with  ease  and  opportunity  to  all 
varieties  of  men.  Many  who  have  '  plied 
•  their  book  diligently/  and  know  all  about 
some  one  branch  or  another  of  accepted  lore, 
come  out  of  the  study  with  an  ancient  and 
owl-like  demeanour,  and  prove  dry,  stockish, 
and  dyspeptic  in  all  the  better  and  brighter 
parts  of  life.  Many  make  a  large  fortune 
who  remain  underbred  and  pathetically  stupid 
to  the  last.  And  meantime  there  goes  the 
idl  er,  who  began  life  along  with  them — by 
your  leave,  a  different  picture.  He  has  had 

112 


time  to  take  care  of  his  health  and  his  spirits  ; 
he  has  been  a  great  deal  in  the  open  air,  which 
is  the  most  salutary  of  all  things  for  both  body 
and  mind  ;  and  if  he  has  never  read  the  great 
Book  in  very  recondite  places,  he  has  dipped 
into  it  and  skimmed  it  over  to  excellent  purpose. 
Might  not  the  student  afTord  some  Hebrew 
roots,  and  the  business  man  some  of  his  half- 
crowns,  for  a  share  of  the  idler's  knowledge  of 
life  at  large,  and  Art  of  Living  ? 

"\J  AY,  and  the  idler  has  another  and  more 
•^  important  quality  than  these.  I  mean 
his  wisdom.  He  who  has  much  looked  on 
at  the  childish  satisfaction  of  other  people  in 
their  hobbies,  will  regard  his  own  with  only  a 
very  ironical  indulgence.  He  will  not  be  heard 
among  the  dogmatists.  He  will  have  a  great 
and  cool  allowance  for  all  sorts  of  people  and 
opinions.  If  he  finds  no  out-of-the-way  truths, 
he  will  identify  himself  with  no  very  burning 
falsehood.  His  way  takes  him  along  a  by- 
road, not  much  frequented,  but  very  even  and 
pleasant,  which  is  called  Commonplace  Lane, 
and  leads  to  the  Belvedere  of  Commonsense. 
Thence  he  shall  command  an  agreeable,  if  no 
very  noble  prospect ;  and  while  others  behold 
the  East  and  West,  the  Devil  and  the  sunrise,  he 
will  be  contentedly  aware  of  a  sort  of  morning 
hour  upon  all  sublunary  things,  with  an  army  of 
shadows  running  speedily  and  in  many  different 
directions  into  the  great  daylight  of  Eternity. 
H  113 


T  BEGIN  to  perceive  that  it  is  necessary  to 
•*•  know  some  one  thing  to  the  bottom — 
were  it  only  literature.  And  yet,  sir,  the  man 
of  the  world  is  a  great  feature  of  this  age  ;  he 
is  possessed  of  an  extraordinary  mass  and 
variety  of  knowledge  ;  he  is  everywhere  at 
home ;  he  has  seen  life  in  all  its  phases  ;  and 
it  is  impossible  but  that  this  great  habit  of 
sxistence  should  bear  fruit 

T  AM  sorry  indeed  that  I  have  no  Greek,  but 
•*•  I  should  be  sorrier  still  if  I  were  dead ; 
nor  do  I  know  the  name  of  that  branch  of 
knowledge  which  is  worth  acquiring  at  the 
price  of  a  brain  fever.  There  are  many  sordid 
tragedies  in  the  life  of  the  student,  above  all 
if  he  be  poor,  or  drunken,  or  both ;  but  nothing 
more  moves  a  wise  man's  pity  than  the  case  of 
the  lad  who  is  in  too  much  hurry  to  be  learned. 


•  1Y/T  Y  friend,'  said  I,  *  it  is  not  easy  to  say 
^•'•^  who  know  the  Lord ;  and  it  is  none 
of  our  business.  Protestants  and  Catholics, 
and  even  those  who  worship  stones,  may  know 
Him  and  be  known  by  Him;  for  He  has  made 
all.' 


/^IIEYLARD  scrapes  together  halfpence 
^^  for  the  darkened  souls  in  Edinburgh ; 
while  Balquhidder  and  Dunrossness  bemoans 
the  ignorance  of  Rome.  Thus,  to  the  high 
114 


entertainment  of  the  angels,  do  we  pelt  each 
oihcr  with  evangelists,  like  schoolboys  bicker- 
ing in  the  snow. 

TTJ*  OR  courage  respects  courage  ;  but  where 
•*•  a  faith  has  been  trodden  out,  we  may 
look  for  a  mean  and  narrow  population. 

T  T'S  not  only  a  great  flight  of  confidence  for 
•^  a  man  to  change  his  creed  and  go  out  of 
his  family  for  heaven's  sake ;  but  the  odds  are — 
nay,  and  the  hope  is — that,  with  all  this  great 
transition  in  the  eyes  of  man,  he  has  nek 
changed  himself  a  hairbreadth  to  the  eyes  ot 
God.  Honour  to  those  who  do  so,  for  the 
wrench  is  sore.  But  it  argues  something 
narrow,  whether  of  strength  or  weakness, 
whether  of  the  prophet  or  the  fool,  in  those 
who  can  take  a  sufficient  interest  in  such 
infinitesimal  and  human  operations,  or  who 
can  quit  a  friendship  for  a  doubtful  operation 
of  the  mind.  And  I  think  I  should  not  leave 
my  old  creed  for  another,  changing  only  words 
for  words ;  but  by  some  brave  reading,  embrace 
it  in  spirit  and  truth,  and  find  wrong  as  wrong 
for  me  as  for  the  best  of  other  communions. 

T  T  is  not  a  basketful  of  law-papers,  nor  the 
•*•  hoofs  and  pistol-butts  of  a  regiment  of 
horse,  that  can  change  one  tittle  of  a  plough- 
man's thoughts.  Outdoor  rustic  people  have 
not  many  ideas,  but  such  as  they  have  are 

"5 


hardy  plants,  and  thrive  flourishingly  in  perse- 
cution. One  who  has  grown  a  long  while  in 
the  sweat  of  laborious  noons,  and  under  the 
stars  at  night,  a  frequenter  of  hills  and  forests, 
an  old  honest  countryman,  has,  in  the  end,  a 
sense  of  communion  with  the  powers  of  the 
universe,  and  amicable  relations  towards  his 
God.  Like  my  mountain  Plymouth  Brother, 
he  knows  the  Lord.  His  religion  does  not 
repose  upon  a  choice  of  logic ;  it  is  the  poetry 
of  the  man's  existence,  the  philosophy  of  the 
history  of  his  life.  God,  like  a  great  power, 
like  a  great  shining  sun,  has  appeared  to  this 
simple  fellow  in  the  course  of  years,  and 
become  the  ground  and  essence  of  his  least 
reflections ;  and  you  may  change  creeds  and 
dogmas  by  authority,  or  proclaim  a  new 
religion  with  the  sound  of  trumpets,  if  you 
will ;  but  here  is  a  man  who  has  his  own 
thoughts,  and  will  stubbornly  adhere  to  them 
in  good  and  evil.  He  is  a  Catholic,  a  Pro- 
testant, or  a  Plymouth  Brother,  in  the  same 
indefeasible  sense  that  a  man  is  not  a  woman, 
or  a  woman  is  not  a  man.  For  he  could  not 
vary  from  his  faith,  unless  he  could  eradicate 
all  memory  of  the  past,  and,  in  a  strict  and 
not  conventional  meaning,  change  his  mind. 

1C  OR  still  the  Lord  is  Lord  of  might ; 
•*•        In  deeds,  in  deeds,  he  takes  delight  j 
The  plough,  the  spear,  the  laden  barks, 
The  field,  the  founded  city,  marks ; 
1x6 


He  marks  the  smiler  of  the  streets, 
The  singer  upon  garden  seats  ; 
He  sees  the  climber  in  the  rocks  : 
To  him,  the  shepherd  folds  his  flocks. 
For  those  he  loves  that  underprop 
With  daily  virtues  Heaven's  top, 
And  bear  the  falling  sky  with  ease, 
Unfrowning  caryatides. 
Those  he  approves  that  ply  the  trade, 
That  rock  the  child,  that  wed  the  maid, 
That  with  weak  virtues,  weaker  hands, 
Sow  gladness  on  the  peopled  lands, 
And  still  with  laughter,  song  and  shout, 
Spin  the  great  wheel  of  earth  about. 

/T*HE  shadow  of  a  great  oak  lies  abroad 
•*•  upon  the  ground  at  noon,  perfect,  clear, 
and  stable  like  the  earth.  But  let  a  man  set 
himself  to  mark  out  the  boundary  with  cords 
and  pegs,  and  were  he  never  so  nimble  and 
never  so  exact,  what  with  the  multiplicity  of 
the  leaves  and  the  progression  of  the  shadow 
as  it  flees  before  the  travelling  sun,  long  ere  he 
has  made  the  circuit  the  whole  figure  will  have 
changed.  Life  may  be  compared,  not  to  a 
single  tree,  but  to  a  great  and  complicated 
forest ;  circumstance  is  more  swiftly  changing 
than  a  shadow,  language  much  more  inexact 
than  the  tools  of  a  surveyor ;  from  day  to 
day  the  trees  fall  and  are  renewed  ;  the  very 
essences  are  fleeting  as  we  look  ;  and  the 
whole  world  of  leaves  is  swinging  tempest- 
117 


tossed  among  the  winds  of  time.  Look  now 
for  your  shadows.  O  man  of  formulae,  is 
this  a  place  for  you?  Have  you  fitted  the 
spirit  to  a  single  case  ?  Alas,  in  the  cycle  of 
the  ages  when  shall  such  another  be  proposed 
for  the  judgment  of  man  ?  Now  when  the  sun 
shines  and  the  winds  blow,  the  wood  is  filled 
with  an  innumerable  multitude  of  shadows, 
tumultuously  tossed  and  changing ;  and  at 
every  gust  the  whole  carpet  leaps  and  becomes 
new.  Can  you  or  your  heart  say  more  ? 

INDEED,  I  can  see  no  dishonesty  in  not 
avowing  a  difference ;  and  especially  in 
these  high  matters,  where  we  have  all  a 
sufficient  assurance  that,  whoever  may  be  in 
the  wrong,  we  ourselves  are  not  completely 
right.  ...  I  know  right  well  that  we  are  all 
embarked  upon  a  troublesome  world,  the 
children  of  one  Father,  striving  in  many 
essential  points  to  do  and  to  become  the  same. 

/Tn*HE  word  'facts'  is,  in  some  ways,  crucial. 
•*~  I  have  spoken  with  Jesuits  and  Plymouth 
Brethren,  mathematicians  and  poets,  dogmatic 
republicans  and  dear  old  gentlemen  in  bird's- 
eye  neckcloths  ;  and  each  understood  the  word 
'facts'  in  an  occult  sense  of  his  own.  Try  as 
I  might,  I  could  get  no  nearer  the  principle  of 
their  division.  What  was  essential  to  them, 
seemed  to  me  trivial  or  untrue.  We  could 
com?  to  no  compromise  as  to  what  was,  or 
118 


what  was  not,  important  in  the  life  of  man. 
Turn  as  we  pleased,  we  all  stood  back  to  back 
in  a  big  ring,  and  saw  another  quarter  of  the 
heavens,  with  different  mountain-tops  along 
the  sky-line  and  different  constellations  over 
head.  We  had  each  of  us  some  whimsy  in 
the  brain,  which  we  believed  more  than  any- 
thing else,  and  which  discoloured  all  experience 
to  its  own  shade.  How  would  you  have  people 
agree,  when  one  is  deaf  and  the  other  blind  ? 

HP  HE  average  man  lives,  and  must  live,  so 
•*•  wholly  in  convention,  that  gunpowder 
charges  of  the  truth  are  more  apt  to  discompose 
than  to  invigorate  his  creed.  Either  he  cries 
out  upon  blasphemy  and  indecency,  and 
crouches  the  closer  round  that  little  idol  of 
part-truth  and  part-conveniences  which  is  the 
contemporary  deity,  or  he  is  convinced  by 
what  is  new,  forgets  what  is  old,  and  becomes 
truly  blasphemous  and  indecent  himself.  New 
truth  is  only  wanted  to  expand,  not  to  destroy, 
our  civil  and  often  elegant  conventions.  He 
who  cannot  judge  had  better  stick  to  fiction 
and  the  da'ily  papers.  There  he  will  get  little 
harm,  and,  in  the  first  at  least,  some  good. 

/T*HE  human  race  is  a  thing  more  ancient 
•*•  than  the  ten  commandments;  and  the 
bones  and  the  revolutions  of  the  Kosmos  io 
whose  joints  we  are  but  moss  and  fungus,  more 
ancient  stilL 


/T*HE  canting  moralist  tells  us  of  right  and 
•*•  wrong  ;  and  we  look  abroad,  even  on 
the  face  of  our  small  earth,  and  find  them 
change  with  every  climate,  and  no  country 
where  some  action  is  not  honoured  for  a  virtue 
and  none  where  it  is  not  branded  for  a  vice ; 
and  we  look  into  our  experience,  and  find  no 
vital  congruity  in  the  wisest  rules,  but  at  the 
best  a  municipal  fitness.  It  is  not  strange  if  we 
are  tempted  to  despair  of  good.  We  ask  too 
much.  Our  religions  and  moralities  have  been 
trimmed  to  flatter  us,  till  they  are  all  emas- 
culate and  sentimentalised,  and  only  please 
and  weaken.  Truth  is  of  a  rougher  strain. 
In  the  harsh  face  of  life,  faith  can  read  a  bracing 
gospel. 

/^ENTLENESS  and  cheerfulness,  these 
^-^^"come^before  all  morality ;  they  are  the 
perfect  duties.  .  .  . [If  your  morals  make  you 
dreary,  depend  upon  it  they  are  wrong.]  I  do 
not  say  'give  them  up,'  for  they  may  be  all 
you  have ;  but  conceal  them  like  a  vice,  lest 
they  should  spoil  the  lives  of  better  and  simpler 
people. 

'"INHERE  is  no  quite  good  book  without  a 
•^  good  morality ;  but  the  world  is  wide, 
and  so  are  morals.  Out  of  two  people  who 
have  dipped  into  Sir  Richard  Burton's  Thou- 
sand and  One  Nightst  one  shall  have  been 
-aflfended  by  the  animal  details;  another  to 

120 


whom  these  were  harmless,  perhaps  even  pleas- 
ing, shall  yet  have  been  shocked  in  his  turn 
by  the  rascality  and  cruelty  of  all  the  charac- 
ters. Of  two  readers,  again,  one  shall  have 
been  pained  by  the  morality  of  a  religious 
memoir,  one  by  that  of  the  Vicomte  de  Bra- 
gelonne.  And  the  point  is  that  neither  need 
be  wrong.  We  shall  always  shock  each  other 
both  in  life  and  art;  we  cannot  get  the  sun 
into  our  pictures,  nor  the  abstract  right  (if 
there  be  such  a  thing)  into  our  books ;  enough 
if,  in  the  one,  there  glimmer  some  hint  of  the 
great  light  that  blinds  us  from  heaven  ;  enough 
if,  in  the  other,  there  shine,  even  upon  foul 
details,  a  spirit  of  magnanimity. 

"pOR  to  do  anything  because  others  do  it, 
•^  and  not  because  the  thing  is  good,  or 
kind,  or  honest  in  its  own  right,  is  to  resign  all 
moral  control  and  captaincy  upon  yourself, 
and  go  post-haste  to  the  devil  with  the  greater 
number. 

The  respectable  are  not  led  so  much  by  any 
desire  of  applause  as  by  a  positive  need  for 
countenance.  The  weaker  and  the  tamer  the 
man,  the  more  will  he  require  this  support ; 
and  any  positive  quality  relieves  him,  by  just 
so  much,  of  this  dependence. 

TTAPPINESS  and  goodness,  according  to 
canting  moralists,  stand  in  the  relation 
of  effect  and  cause.    There  was  never  anything 
121 


less  proved  or  less  probable :  our  happiness  is 
never  in  our  own  hands ;  we  inherit  our  con- 
stitutions ;  we  stand  buffet  among  friends  and 
enemies ;  we  may  be  so  built  as  to  feel  a  sneer  or 
an  aspersion  with  unusual  keenness,  and  so  cir- 
cumstanced as  to  be  unusually  exposed  to  them; 
we  may  have  nerves  very  sensitive  to  pain,  and 
be  afflicted  with  a  disease  more  painful.  Virtue 
will  not  help  us,  and  it  is  not  meant  to  help 
us.  It  is  not  even  its  own  reward,  except  for 
the  self-centred  and — I  had  almost  said — the 
unamiable. 

T  OBLE  disappointment,  noble  self-denial, 
'  are  not  to  be  admired,  not  even  to  be 
pardoned,  if  they  bring  bitterness.  It  is  one 
thing  to  enter  the  kingdom  of  heaven  maim ; 
another  to  maim  yourself  and  stay  without 

TO  make  our  idea  of  morality  centre  on 
forbidden  acts  is  to  defile  the  imagina- 
tion and  to  introduce  into  our  judgments  of 
our  fellow-men  a  secret  element  of  gusto.  If 
a  thing  is  wrong  for  us,  we  should  not  dwell 
upon  the  thought  of  it ;  or  we  shall  soon  dwell 
upon  it  with  inverted  pleasure. 

/~T*HERE  is  a  certain  class,  professors  of  that 
•*•  low  morality  so  greatly  more  distressing 
than  the  better  sort  of  vice,  to  whom  you  must 
never  represent  an  act  that  was  virtuous  in 
itself,  as  attended  by  any  other  consequences 
than  a  large  family  and  fortune. 

122 


A  LL  have  some  fault.  The  fault  of  each 
^"^  grinds  down  the  hearts  of  those  about 
him,  and — let  us  not  blink  the  truth — hurries 
both  him  and  them  into  the  grave.  And  when 
we  find  a  man  persevering  indeed,  in  his  fault, 
as  all  of  us  do,  and  openly  overtaken,  as  not 
all  of  us  are,  by  its  consequences,  to  gloss  the 
matter  over,  with  too  polite  biographers,  is  to 
do  the  work  of  the  wrecker  disfiguring  beacons 
on  a  perilous  seaboard ;  but  to  call  him  bad, 
with  a  self-righteous  chuckle,  is  to  be  talking 
in  one's  sleep  with  Heedless  and  Too-bold  in 
the  arbour. 


npHE  most  influential  books,  and  the  truest 
•••  in  their  influence,  are  works  of  fiction. 
They  do  not  pin  the  reader  to  a  dogma,  which 
he  must  afterwards  discover  to  be  inexact ; 
they  do  not  teach  a  lesson,  which  he  must 
afterwards  unlearn.  They  repeat,  they  re- 
arrange, they  clarify  the  lessons  of  life  ;  they 
disengage  us  from  ourselves,  they  constrain  as 
to  the  acquaintance  of  others ;  and  they  show 
us  the  web  of  experience,  not  as  we  can  see  it 
for  ourselves,  but  with  a  singular  change — that 
monstrous,  consuming  ego  of  ours  being,  for 
the  nonce,  struck  out.  To  be  so,  they  must 
be  reasonably  true  to  the  human  comedy  ;  and 
any  work  that  is  50  serves  ihe  turn  of  instruc- 
tion. 


123 


"M'ATURE  is  a  good  guide  through  life, 
•*"  and  the  love  of  simple  pleasures  next, 
if  not  superior,  to  virtue. 

/T*HE  soul  asks  honour  and  not  fame ;  to  be 
•••       upright,    not   to   be    successful ;    to   be 
good,  not  prosperous ;  to  be  essentially,  not 
outwardly,  respectable. 

"DRACTICE  is  a  more  intricate  and  desper- 
•*•  ate  business  than  the  toughest  theorising; 
life  is  an  affair  of  cavalry,  where  rapid  judgment 
and  prompt  action  are  alone  possible  and  right. 

T^ACII  man  should  learn  what  is  within 
•*-**  him,  that  he  may  strive  to  mend  ;  he 
must  be  taught  what  is  without  him,  that  he 
may  be  kind  to  others.  It  can  never  be  wrong 
to  tell  him  the  truth  ;  for,  in  his  disputable 
state,  weaving  as  he  goes  his  theory  of  life, 
steering  himself,  cheering  or  reproving  others, 
all  facts  are  of  the  first  importance  to  his  con- 
duct ;  and  even  if  a  fact  shall  discourage  or 
corrupt  him,  it  is  still  best  that  he  should  know 
it ;  for  it  is  in  this  world  as  it  is,  and  not  in  a 
world  made  easy  by  educational  suppression, 
that  he  must  win  his  way  to  shame  or  glory. 

A    GENEROUS  prayer  is  never  presented 

*^~^     in  vain  ;   the  petition   may  be  refused, 

but  the  petitioner  is  always,  I  believe,  rewarded 

by  some  gracious  visitation. 

124 


EVENSONG 

THE  embers  of  the  day  are  red 
Beyond  the  murky  hill. 
The  kitchen  smokes  :  the  bed 
In  the  darkling  house  is  spread : 
The  great  sky  darkens  overhead, 
And  the  great  woods  are  shrill. 
So  far  have  I  been  led, 
Lord,  by  Thy  will : 

So  far  I  have  followed,  Lord,  and  wondered 
still. 

The  breeze  from  the  embalmed  land 
Blows  sudden  toward  the  shore, 
And  claps  my  cottage  door. 
I  hear  the  signal,  Lord — I  understand. 
The  night  at  Thy  command 
Comes.     I  will  eat  and  sleep  and  will  not 
question  more. 

TT  is  not  at  all  a  strong  thing  to  put  one's 
•*•  reliance  upon  logic ;  and  our  own  logic 
particularly,  for  it  is  generally  wrong.  We 
never  know  where  we  are  to  end  if  once  we 
begin  following  words  or  doctors.  There  is 
an  upright  stock  in  a  man's  own  heart  that  is 
trustier  than  any  syllogism  ;  and  the  eyes,  and 
the  sympathies,  and  appetites  know  a  thing  or 
two  that  have  never  yet  been  stated  in  contro- 
versy. Reasons  are  as  plentiful  as  black- 
berries ;  and,  like  fisticuffs,  they  serve  im- 
partially with  all  sides.  Doctrines  do  not 


stand  or  fall  by  their  proofs,  and  are  only 
logical  in  so  far  as  they  are  cleverly  put.  An 
able  controversialist  no  more  than  an  able 
general  demonstrates  the  justice  of  his  cause. 

TO  any  man  there  may  come  at  times  a 
consciousness  that  there  blows,  through 
all  the  articulations  of  his  body,  the  wind  of  a 
spirit  not  wholly  his ;  that  his  mind  rebels  ; 
that  another  girds  him  and  carries  him  whither 
he  would  not. 


/T"HE  child,  the  seed,  the  grain  of  corn, 
•••       The  acorn  on  the  hill, 
Each  for  some  separate  end  is  born 
In  season  fit,  and  still 

Each   must   in   strength  arise  to  work  the 
almighty  will. 

So  from  the  hearth  the  children  flee, 
By  that  almighty  hand 
Austerely  led  ;  so  one  by  sea 
Goes  forth,  and  one  by  land  ; 
Nor  aught  of  all  man's  sons  escapes  from  that 
command. 

So  from  the  sally  each  obeys 
The  unseen  almighty  nod  ; 
So  till  the  ending  all  their  ways 
Blindfolded  loth  have  trod  : 
Nor  knew  their  task  at  all,  but  were  the 
tools  of  God. 


A  FEW  restrictions,  indeed,  remain  to 
•^""^  influence  the  followers  of  individual 
branches  of  study.  The  Divinity,  for  ex- 
ample, must  be  an  avowed  believer ;  and  as 
this,  in  the  present  day,  is  unhappily  con- 
sidered by  many  as  a  confession  of  weakness, 
he  is  fain  to  choose  one  of  two  ways  of  gilding 
the  distasteful  orthodox  bolus.  Some  swallow 
it  in  a  thin  jelly  of  metaphysics ;  for  it  is  even 
a  credit  to  believe  in  God  on  the  evidence  of 
some  crack-jaw  philosopher,  although  it  is  a 
decided  slur  to  believe  in  Him  on  His  own 
authority.  Others  again  (and  this  we  think 
the  worst  method),  finding  German  grammar 
a  somewhat  dry  morsel,  run  their  own  little 
heresy  as  a  proof  of  independence  ;  and  deny 
one  of  the  cardinal  doctrines  that  they  may 
hold  the  others  without  being  laughed  at. 


T  N  particular,  I  heard  of  clergymen  who 
were  employing  their  time  in  explaining 
to  a  delighted  audience  the  physics  of  the 
Second  Coming.  It  is  not  very  likely  any  of 
us  will  be  asked  to  help.  If  we  were,  it  is 
likely  we  should  receive  instructions  for  the 
occasion,  and  that  on  more  reliable  authority. 
And  so  I  can  only  figure  to  myself  a  congrega- 
tion truly  curious  in  such  flights  of  theological 
fancy,  as  one  of  veteran  and  accomplished 
saints,  who  have  fought  the  good  fight  to  an 
end  and  outlived  all  worldly  passion,  and  axe 
127 


to  be  regarded  rather  as  a  part  of  the  Church 
Triumphant  than  the  poor,  imperfect  company 
on  earth. 

/TVHE  whole  creation  groaneth  and  travaileth 
•*•  together.  It  is  the  common  and  the 
god-like  law  of  life.  The  browsers,  the  biters, 
the  barkers,  the  hairy  coats  of  field  and  forest, 
the  squirrel  in  the  oak,  the  thousand-footed 
creeper  in  the  dust,  as  they  share  with  us  the 
gift  of  life,  share  with  us  the  love  of  an  ideal ; 
strive  like  us — like  us  are  tempted  to  grow 
weary  of  the  struggle — to  do  well ;  like  us  re- 
ceive at  times  unmerited  refreshment,  visitings 
of  support,  returns  of  courage ;  and  are  con- 
demned like  us  to  be  crucified  between  that 
double  law  of  the  members  and  the  will.  Are 
they  like  us,  I  wonder,  in  the  timid  hope  of 
some  reward,  some  sugar  with  the  drug  ?  Do 
they,  too,  stand  aghast  at  unrewarded  virtues, 
at  the  sufferings  of  those  whom,  in  our  par- 
tiality, we  take  to  be  just,  and  the  prosperity 
of  such  as  in  our  blindness  we  call  wicked  ? 


"OUT  to  be  a  true  disciple  is  to  think  of  the 
•*-^  same  things  as  our  prophet,  and  to  think 
of  different  things  in  the  same  order.  To  be 
of  the  same  mind  with  another  is  to  see  all 
things  in  the  same  perspective ;  it  is  not  to 
agree  in  a  few  indifferent  matters  near  at  hand 
and  not  much  debated ;  it  is  to  follow  him  in 

148 


his  farthest  flights,  to  see  the  force  of  his 
hyperboles,  to  stand  so  exactly  in  the  centre 
of  his  vision  that  whatever  he  may  express, 
your  eyes  will  light  at  once  on  the  original, 
that  whatever  he  may  see  to  declare,  your 
mind  will  at  once  accept.  .  .  . 

Now,  every  now  and  then,  and  indeed 
surprisingly  often,  Christ  finds  a  word  that 
transcends  all  commonplace  morality;  every 
now  and  then  He  quits  the  beaten  track  to 
pioneer  the  unexpressed,  and  throws  out  a 
pregnant  and  magnanimous  hyperbole  ;  for  it 
is  only  by  some  bold  poetry  of  thought  that 
men  can  be  strung  up  above  the  level  of  every- 
day conceptions  to  take  a  broader  look  upon 
experience  or  accept  some  higher  principle  of 
conduct.  To  a  man  who  is  of  the  same  mind 
that  was  in  Christ,  who  stands  at  some  centre 
not  too  far  from  His,  and  looks  at  the  world 
and  conduct  from  some  not  dissimilar  or,  at 
least,  not  opposing  attitude — or,  shortly,  to  a 
man  who  is  of  Christ's  philosophy — every  such 
saying  should  come  home  with  a  thrill  of  joy 
and  corroboration ;  he  should  feel  each  one 
below  his  feet  as  another  sure  foundation  in 
the  flux  of  time  and  chance ;  each  should  be 
another  proof  that  in  the  torrent  of  the  years 
and  generations,  where  doctrines  and  great 
armaments  and  empires  are  swept  away  and 
swallowed,  he  stands  immovable,  holding  by 
the  eternal  stars. 

I  129 


whc  play  by  rule  will  never  be 
•*•  more  than  tolerable  players  ;  and  you 
and  I  would  like  to  play  our  game  in  life  to 
the  noblest  and  the  most  divine  advantage. 
.  .  .  For  no  definite  precept  can  be  more 
than  an  illustration,  though  its  truth  were 
resplendent  like  the  sun,  and  it  was  announced 
from  heaven  by  the  voice  of  God.  And  life 
is  so  intricate  and  changing,  that  perhaps  not 
twenty  times,  or  perhaps  not  twice  in  the  ages, 
shall  we  find  that  nice  consent  of  circumstances 
to  which  alone  it  can  apply.  .  .  . 

It  is  to  keep  a  man  awake,  to  keep  him 
alive  to  his  own  soul  and  its  fixed  design  of 
righteousness,  that  the  better  part  of  moral 
and  religious  education  is  direct^  ;  not  only 
that  of  words  and  doctors,  but  the  sharp  ferule 
of  calamity  under  which  we  are  all  God's 
scholars  till  we  die.  If,  as  teachers,  we  are 
to  say  anything  to  the  purpose,  we  must  say 
what  will  remind  the  pupil  of  his  soul ;  we 
must  speak  that  soul's  dialect ;  we  must  talk 
of  life  and  conduct  as  his  soul  would  have  him 
think  of  them.  If,  from  some  conformity 
between  us  and  the  pupil,  or  perhaps  among 
all  men,  we  do  in  truth  speak  in  such  a  dialect 
and  express  such  views,  beyond  question  we 
shall  touch  in  him  a  spring ;  beyond  question 
he  will  recognise  the  dialect  as  one  that  he 
himself  has  spoken  in  his  better  hours ;  beyond 
question  he  will  cry,  '  I  had  forgotten,  but 
now  I  remember ;  I  too  have  eyes,  and  I  had 
130 


forgot  to  use  them  !  I  too  have  a  soul  of  my 
own,  arrogantly  upright,  and  to  that  I  will 
listen  and  conform.'  In  short,  say  to  him 
anything  that  he  has  once  thought,  or  been 
upon  the  point  of  thinking,  or  show  him  any 
view  of  life  that  he  has  once  clearly  seen,  or 
been  on  the  point  of  clearly  seeing ;  and  you 
have  done  your  part  and  may  leave  him,  to 
complete  the  education  for  himself. 

/'"""CD,  if  there  be  any  God,  speaks  daily  in 
^-*  a  new  language,  by  the  tongues  of  men  ; 
the  thoughts  and  habits  of  each  fresh  genera- 
tion and  each  new-coined  spirit  throw  another 
light  upon  the  universe,  and  contain  another 
commentary  on  the  printed  Bibles ;  every 
scruple,  every  true  dissent,  every  glimpse  of 
something  new,  is  a  letter  of  God's  alphabet ; 
and  though  there  is  a  grave  responsibility  for 
all  who  speak,  is  there  none  for  those  who 
unrighteously  keep  silent  and  conform?  Is 
not  that  also  to  conceal  and  cloak  God's 
counsel  ? 

1Y/TANKIND    is    not    only    the    whole   in 
general,  but  every  one  in  particular. 
Every  man  or  woman  is  one    of    mankind's 
dear  possessions ;    to  his    or  her   just   brain, 
and  kind  heart,   and  active  hands,  mankind 
intrusts  some  of  its  hopes  for  the  future ;  he 
or  she  is  a  possible   wellspring   of  good  acts 
and  source  of  blessings  to  the  race. 
131 


ORALS  are  a  personal  affair;  in  the 
war  of  righteousness  every  man  fights 
for  his  own  hand  ;  all  the  six  hundred  precepts 
of  the  Mishna  cannot  shake  my  private 
judgment ;  my  magistracy  of  myself  is  an 
indefeasible  charge,  and  my  decisions  absolute 
for  the  time  and  case.  The  moralist  is  not  a 
judge  of  appeal,  but  an  advocate  who  pleads 
at  my  tribunal.  He  has  to  show  not  the  law, 
but  that  the  law  applies.  Can  he  convince 
me  ?  then  he  gains  the  cause.  And  thus  you 
find  Christ  giving  various  counsels  to  varying 
people,  and  often  jealously  careful  to  avoid 
definite  precept.  Is  lie  asked,  for  example, 
to  divide  a  heritage  ?  He  refuses  ;  and  the 
best  advice  that  He  will  offer  is  but  a  para- 
phrase of  the  tenth  commandment  which 
figures  so  strangely  among  the  rest.  Take 
heed,  and  beware  of  covdousness.  If  you 
complain  that  this  is  vague,  I  have  failed  to 
carry  you  along  with  me  in  my  argument. 
For  no  definite  precept  can  be  more  than  an 
illustration,  though  its  truth  were  resplendent 
like  the  sun,  and  it  was  announced  from 
heaven  by  the  voice  of  God.  And  life  is  so 
intricate  and  changing,  that  perhaps  not 
twenty  times,  or  perhaps  not  twice  in  the 
ages,  shall  we  find  that  nice  consent  of  cir- 
cumstances to  which  alone  it  can  apply. 


132 


T)UT  if  it  is  righteousness  thus  to  fuse 
•*~^  together  our  divisive  impulses  and  march 
with  one  mind  through  life,  there  is  plainly 
one  thing  more  unrighteous  than  all  others, 
and  one  declension  which  is  irretrievable  and 
draws  on  the  rest.  And  this  is  to  lose 
consciousness  of  oneself.  In  the  best  of  times, 
it  is  but  by  flashes,  when  our  whole  nature 
is  clear,  strong,  and  conscious,  and  events 
conspire  to  leave  us  free,  that  we  enjoy  com- 
munion with  our  soul.  At  the  worst  we  are 
so  fallen  and  passive  that  we  may  say  shortly 
we  have  none.  An  arctic  torpor  seizes  upon 
men.  Although  built  of  nerves,  and  set  adrift 
in  a  stimulating  world,  they  develop  a 
tendency  to  go  bodily  to  sleep ;  conscious- 
ness becomes  engrossed  among  the  reflex  and 
mechanical  parts  of  life ;  and  soon  loses  both 
the  will  and  power  to  look  higher  consider- 
ations in  the  face.  This  is  ruin ;  this  is  the 
last  failure  in  life  ;  this  is  temporal  damnation, 
damnation  on  the  spot  and  without  the  form 
of  judgment :  '  What  shall  it  profit  a  man  if 
he  gain  the  whole  world  and  lose  himself?' 

^O  ask  to  see  some  fruit  of  our  endeavour 
•*       is  but  a  transcendental  way  of  serving 
for  reward  ;  and  what  we  take  to  be  contempt 
of  self  is  only  greed  of  hire. 

VWE  are  all  such  as  He  was — the  inheritors 
of  sin  ;  we  must  all  bear  and  expiate 
a  past  which  was  not  ours ;  there  is  in  all  of 
*33 


us— ay,  even  in  me— a  sparkle  of  the  divine. 
Like  Him,  we  must  endure  for  a  little  while, 
until  morning  returns,  bringing  peace. 


A  HUMAN  truth,  which  is  always  very 
**•  much  a  lie,  hides  as  much  of  life  as 
it  displays.  It  is  men  who  hold  another 
truth,  or,  as  it  seems  to  us,  perhaps,  a 
dangerous  lie,  who  can  extend  our  restricted 
field  of  knowledge,  and  rouse  our  drowsy 
consciences. 


nPRUTII  of  intercourse  is  something  more 
-*•  difficult  than  to  refrain  from  open  lies. 
It  is  possible  to  avoid  falsehood  and  yet  not 
tell  the  truth.  It  is  not  enough  to  answer 
formal  questions.  To  reach  the  truth  by  yea 
and  nay  communications  implies  a  questioner 
with  a  share  of  inspiration,  such  as  is  often 
found  in  mutual  love.  Yea  and  nay  mean 
nothing ;  the  meaning  must  have  been  related 
in  the  question.  Many  words  are  often 
necessary  to  convey  a  very  simple  statement ; 
for  in  this  sort  of  exercise  we  never  hit  the 
gold ;  the  most  that  we  can  hope  is  by  many 
arrows,  more  or  less  fajr  off  on  different  sides,  to 
indicate,  in  the  course  of  time,  for  what  target 
we  are  aiming,  and  after  an  hour's  talk,  back 
and  forward,  to  convey  the  purport  of  a  single 
principle  or  a  single  thought. 
134 


'"pIIE  cruellest  lies  are  often  told  in  silence. 
•*•  A  man  may  have  sat  in  a  room  for 
hours  and  not  opened  his  teeth,  and  yet  come 
out  of  that  room  a  disloyal  friend  or  a  vile 
calumniator.  And  how  many  loves  have 
perished  because,  from  pride,  or  spite,  or 
diffidence,  or  that  unmanly  shame  which  with- 
holds a  man  from  daring  to  betray  emotion, 
a  lover,  at  the  critical  point  of  the  relation, 
has  but  hung  his  head  and  held  his  tongue? 
And,  again,  a  lie  may  be  told  by  a  truth,  or 
a  truth  conveyed  through  a  lie.  Truth  to 
facts  is  not  always  truth  to  sentiment ;  and 
part  of  the  truth,  as  often  happens  in  answer 
to  a  question,  may  be  the  foulest  calumny. 
A  fact  may  be  an  exception  ;  but  the  feeling 
is  the  law,  and  it  is  that  which  you  must 
neither  garble  nor  belie.  The  whole  tenor  of 
a  conversation  is  a  part  of  the  meaning  of 
each  separate  statement ;  the  beginning  and 
the  end  define  and  travesty  the  intermediate 
conversation.  You  never  speak  to  God  ;  you 
address  a  fellow-man,  full  of  his  own  tempers  : 
and  to  tell  truth,  rightly  understood,  is  not  to 
state  the  true  facts,  but  to  convey  a  true  im- 
pression ;  truth  in  spirit,  not  truth  to  letter,  is 
the  true  veracity./ 

T  T  E  talked  for  the  pleasure  of  airing  him- 

self.       He    was     essentially    glib,     as 

becomes  the  young  advocate,  and  essentially 

careless  of  the  truth,  which  is  the  mark  of  the 

135 


young  ass ;  and  so  he  talked  at  random.  There 
was  no  particular  bias,  but  that  one  which  is 
indigenous  and  universal,  to  flatter  himself, 
and  to  please  and  interest  the  present  friend. 

T  T  OW  wholly  we  all  lie  at  the  mercy  of  a 
•*•  single  prater,  not  needfully  with  any 
malign  purpose  !  And  if  a  man  but  talk  of 
himself  in  the  right  spirit,  refers  to  his 
virtuous  actions  by  the  way,  and  never  applies 
to  them  the  name  of  virtues,  how  easily  his 
evidence  is  accepted  in  the  court  of  public 
opinion ! 

T  N  one  word,  it  must  always  be  foul  to  tell 
•••  what  is  false ;  and  it  can  never  be  safe  to 
suppress  what  is  true. 

/CONCLUSIONS,  indeed,  are  not  often 
^-^  reached  by  talk  any  more  than  by  private 
thinking.  That  is  not  the  profit.  The  profit 
is  in  the  exercise,  and  above  all  in  the  ex- 
perience ;  for  when  we  reason  at  large  on  any 
subject,  we  review  our  state  and  history  in  life. 
From  time  to  time,  however,  and  specially,  I 
think,  in  talking  art,  talk  becomes  effective, 
conquering  like  war,  widening  the  boundaries 
of  knowledge  like  an  exploration. 

NATURAL  talk,  like   ploughing,  should 
turn  up  a  large  surface  of  life,  rather 
than  dig  mines  into  geological  strata.     Masses 


of  experience,  anecdote,  incident,  cross-lights, 
quotation,  historical  instances,  the  whole  flot- 
sam and  jetsam  of  two  minds  forced  in  and 
in  upon  the  matter  in  hand  from  every  point 
of  the  compass,  and  from  every  degree  of 
mental  elevation  and  abasement — these  are 
the  material  with  which  talk  is  fortified,  the 
food  on  which  the  talkers  thrive.  Such  argu- 
ment as  is  proper  to  the  exercise  should  still 
be  brief  and  seizing.  Talk  should  proceed 
by  instances;  by  the  apposite,  not  the  exposi- 
tory. It  should  keep  close  along  the  lines  of 
humanity,  near  the  bosoms  and  businesses  of 
men,  at  the  level  where  history,  fiction,  and 
experience  intersect  and  illuminate  each 
other. 


HP  HERE  can  be  no  fairer  ambition  than  to 
excel  in  talk ;  to  be  affable,  gay,  ready, 
clear  and  welcome  ;  to  have  a  fact,  a  thought, 
or  an  illustration,  pat  to  every  subject;  and 
not  only  to  cheer  the  flight  of  time  among  our 
intimates,  but  bear  our  part  in  that  great 
international  congress,  always  sitting,  where 
public  wrongs  are  first  declared,  public  errors 
first  corrected,  and  the  course  of  public  opinion 
shaped,  day  by  day,  a  little  nearer  to  the  right 
No  measure  comes  before  Parliament  but  it 
has  been  long  ago  prepared  by  the  grand  jury 
of  the  talkers  ;  no  book  is  written  that  has 
cot  been  largely  composed  by  their  assist- 
137 


ance.  Literature  in  many  of  its  branches  is 
no  other  than  the  shadow  of  good  talk ;  but 
the  imitation  falls  far  short  of  the  original  in 
life,  freedom,  and  effect.  There  are  always  two 
to  a  talk,  giving  and  taking,  comparing  experi- 
ence and  according  conclusions.  Talk  is  fluid, 
tentative,  continually  'in  further  search  and 
progress';  while  written  words  remain  fixed, 
become  idols  even  to  the  writer,  found  wooden 
dogmatisms,  and  preserve  flies  of  obvious  error 
in  the  amber  of  the  truth.  Last  and  chief, 
while  literature,  gagged  with  linsey-woolsey, 
can  only  deal  with  a  fraction  of  the  life  of  man, 
talk  goes  fancy  free  and  may  call  a  spade  a 
spade.  Talk  has  none  of  the  freezing  immuni- 
ties of  the  pulpit.  It  cannot,  even  if  it  would, 
become  merely  aesthetic  or  merely  classical 
like  literature.  A  jest  intervenes,  the  solemn 
humbug  is  dissolved  in  laughter,  and  speech 
runs  forth  out  of  the  contemporary  groove  into 
the  open  fields  of  nature,  cheery  and  cheering, 
like  schoolboys  out  of  school.  And  it  is  in 
talk  alone  that  we  can  learn  our  period  and 
ourselves.  In  short,  the  first  duty  of  a  man 
is  to  speak  ;  that  is  his  chief  business  in  this 
world ;  and  talk,  which  is  the  harmonious 
speech  of  two  or  more,  is  by  far  the  most 
accessible  of  pleasures.  It  costs  nothing  in 
money ;  it  is  all  profit ;  it  completes  our 
education,  founds  and  fosters  our  friendships, 
and  can  be  enjoyed  at  any  age  and  in  almost 
any  state  of  health. 

138 


A  ND  it  happens  that  literature  is,  in  some 
•**•  ways,  but  an  indifferent  means  to  such 
an  end.  Language  is  but  a  poor  bull's-eye 
lantern  wherewith  to  show  off  the  vast  cathe- 
dral of  the  world  ;  and  yet  a  particular  thing 
once  said  in  words  is  so  definite  and  memor- 
able, that  it  makes  us  forget  the  absence  of 
the  many  which  remain  unexpressed  ;  like  a 
bright  window  in  a  distant  view,  which  dazzles 
and  confuses  our  sight  of  its  surroundings. 
There  are  not  words  enough  in  all  Shakes- 
peare to  express  the  merest  fraction  of  a  man's 
experience  in  an  hour.  The  speed  of  the 
eyesight  and  the  hearing,  and  the  continual 
industry  of  the  mind,  produce,  in  ten  minutes, 
what  it  would  require  a  laborious  volume  to 
shadow  forth  by  comparisons  and  roundabout 
approaches.  If  verbal  logic  were  sufficient, 
life  would  be  as  plain  sailing  as  a  piece  of 
Euclid.  But,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  we  make  a 
travesty  of  the  simplest  process  of  thought 
when  we  put  it  into  words ;  for  the  words  are 
all  coloured  and  forsworn,  apply  inaccurately, 
and  bring  with  them,  from  former  uses,  ideas 
of  praise  and  blame  that  have  nothing  to  do 
with  the  question  in  hand.  So  we  must 
always  see  to  it  nearly,  that  we  judge  by  the 
realities  of  life  and  not  by  the  partial  terms 
that  represent  them  in  man's  speech  ;  and  at 
times  of  choice,  we  must  leave  words  upon 
one  side,  and  act  upon  those  brute  convic- 
tions,  unexpressed  and  perhaps  inexpressible; 
739 


which  cannot  be  flourished  in  an  argument, 
but  which  are  truly  the  sum  and  fruit  of  our 
experience.  Words  are  for  communication, 
not  for  judgment.  This  is  what  ever>  thought- 
ful man  knows  for  himself,  for  only  fools  and 
silly  schoolmasters  push  definitions  over  far 
into  the  domain  of  conduct ;  and  the  majority 
of  women,  not  learned  in  these  scholastic 
refinements,  live  all-of-a-piece  and  uncon- 
sciously, as  a  tree  grows,  without  caring  to 
put  a  name  upon  their  acts  or  motives. 

/T*HE  correction  of  silence  is  what  kills; 
-*•  when  you  know  you  have  transgressed, 
and  your  friend  says  nothing  and  avoids  your 
eye.  If  a  man  were  made  of  gutta-percha, 
his  heart  would  quail  at  such  a  moment.  But 
when  the  word  is  out,  the  worst  is  over ;  and 
a  fellow  with  any  good-humour  at  all  may 
pass  through  a  perfect  hail  of  witty  criticism, 
every  bare  place  on  his  soul  hit  to  the  quick 
with  a  shrewd  missile,  and  reappear,  as  if 
after  a  dive,  tingling  with  a  fine  moral  re- 
action, and  ready,  with  a  shrinking  readiness, 
one-third  loath,  for  a  repetition  of  the  dis- 
cipline. 

A  LL  natural  talk  is  a  festival  of  ostentation ; 
-^*-  and  by  the  laws  of  the  game  each  accepts 
and  fans  the  vanity  of  the  other.  It  is  from 
that  reason  that  we  venture  to  lay  ourselves  so 
open,  that  we  dare  to  be  so  warmly  eloquent, 


and  that  we  swell  in  each  other's  eyes  to  such 
a  vast  proportion.  For  talkers,  once  launched, 
begin  to  overflow  the  limits  of  their  ordinary 
selves,  tower  up  to  the  height  of  their  secret 
pretensions,  and  give  themselves  out  for  the 
heroes,  brave,  pious,  musical,  and  wise,  that 
in  their  most  shining  moments  they  aspire  to 
be.  So  they  weave  for  themselves  with  words 
and  for  a  while  inhabit  a  palace  of  delights, 
temple  at  once  and  theatre,  where  they  fill 
the  round  of  the  world's  dignities,  and  feast 
with  the  gods,  exulting  in  Kudos.  And  when 
the  talk  is  over,  each  goes  his  way,  still  flushed 
with  vanity  and  admiration,  still  trailing  clouds 
of  glory ;  each  declines  from  the  height  g,  f  his 
ideal  orgie,  not  in  a  moment,  but  by  slow 
declension. 

"^f  O  man  was  ever  so  poor  that  he  could 
•^  express  all  he  has  in  him  by  words, 
looks,  or  actions ;  his  true  knowledge  is  eter- 
nally incommunicable,  for  it  is  a  knowledge 
of  himself;  and  his  best  wisdom  comes  to  him 
by  no  process  of  the  mind,  but  in  a  supreme 
self-dictation,  which  keeps  varying  from  hour 
to  hour  in  its  dictates  with  the  variation  of 
events  and  circumstances. 

/OVERMASTERING  pain— the  most 

^-^     deadly   and   tragical   element  in  life — 

alas  !  pain  has  its  own  way  with  all  of  us ;  it 

breaks  in,   a    rude   visitant,   upon    the  fairy 

141 


garden  where  the  child  wanders  in  a  dream,  no 
less  surely  than  it  rules  upon  the  field  of  battle, 
or  sends  the  immortal  war-god  whimpering 
to  his  father ;  and  innocence,  no  more  than 
philosophy,  can  protect  us  from  this  sting. 

"\17HERE  did  you  hear  that  it  was  easy  to 
*  be  honest  ?  Do  you  find  that  in  your 
Bible?  Easy?  It  is  easy  to  be  an  ass  and 
follow  the  multitude  like  a  blind,  besotted 
bull  in  a  stampede ;  and  that,  I  am  well  aware, 
is  what  you  and  Mrs.  Grundy  mean  by  being 
honest.  But  it  will  not  bear  the  stress  of  time 
nor  the  scrutiny  of  conscience. 

*T»  HO  UGH  I  have  all  my  life  been  eager 
•*•  for  legitimate  distinction,  I  can  lay  my 
hand  upon  my  heart,  at  the  end  of  my  career, 
and  declare  there  is  not  one — no,  nor  yet  life 
itself — which  is  worth  acquiring  or  preserving 
at  the  slightest  cost  of  dignity. 

T^OR  surely,  at  this  time  of  the  day  in  the 
nineteenth  century,  there  is  nothing  that 
an  honest  man  should  fear  more  timorously 
than  getting  and  spending  more  than  he 
deserves. 

TT  remains  to  be  seen,  by  each  man  who 

would  live  a  true  life  to  himself  and  not 

a  merely  specious  life  to  society,  how  many 

luxuries  he  truly  wants  and  to  how  many  he 

142 


merely  submits  as  to  a  social  propriety ;  and 
all  these  last  he  will  immediately  forswear. 
Let  him  do  this,  and  he  will  be  surprised  to 
find  how  little  money  it  requires  to  keep  him 
in  complete  contentment  and  activity  of  mind 
and  senses.  Life  at  any  level  among  the  easy 
classes  is  conceived  upon  a  principle  of  rivalry, 
where  each  man  and  each  household  must  ape 
the  tastes  and  emulate  the  display  of  others. 
One  is  delicate  in  eating,  another  in  wine,  a 
third  in  furniture  or  works  of  art  or  dress; 
and  I,  who  care  nothing  for  any  of  these 
refinements,  who  am  perhaps  a  plain  athletic 
creature  and  love  exercise,  beef,  beer,  flannel- 
shirts,  and  a  camp  bed,  am  yet  called  upon  to 
assimilate  all  these  other  tastes  and  make  these 
foreign  occasions  of  expenditure  my  own.  It 
may  be  cynical ;  I  am  sure  I  will  be  told  it  is 
selfish ;  but  I  will  spend  my  money  as  I  please 
and  for  my  own  intimate  personal  gratification, 
and  should  count  myself  a  nincompoop  indeed 
to  lay  out  the  colour  of  a  halfpenny  on  any 
fancied  social  decency  or  duty.  I  shall  not 
wear  gloves  unless  my  hands  are  cold,  or 
unless  I  am  born  with  a  delight  in  them. 
Dress  is  my  own  affair,  and  that  of  one  other 
in  the  world  ;  that,  in  fact,  and  for  an  obvious 
reason,  of  any  woman  who  shall  chance  to  be 
in  love  with  me.  I  shall  lodge  where  I  have 
a  mind.  If  I  do  not  ask  society  to  live  with  me, 
they  must  be  silent ;  and  even  if  I  do,  they 
have  no  further  right  but  to  refuse  the  invitation. 
143 


/T*O  be  a  gentleman  is  to  be  one  all  the 
•*-  world  over,  and  in  every  relation  and 
grade  of  society.  It  is  a  high  calling,  to  which 
a  man  must  first  be  born,  and  then  devote 
himself  for  life.  And,  unhappily,  the  manners 
of  a  certain  so-called  upper  grade  have  a  kind 
of  currency,  and  meet  with  a  certain  external 
acceptation  throughout  all  the  others,  and  this 
tends  to  keep  us  well  satisfied  with  slight 
acquirements  and  the  amateurish  accomplish- 
ments of  a  clique.  But  manners,  like  art, 
should  be  human  and  central. 

TJ  ESPECTABILITY  is  a  very  good  thing 
-*-^-  in  its  way,  but  it  does  not  rise  superior 
to  all  considerations.  I  would  not  for  a 
moment  venture  to  hint  that  it  was  a  matter 
of  taste ;  but  I  think  I  will  go  as  far  as  this : 
that  if  a  position  is  admittedly  unkind,  un- 
comfortable, unnecessary,  and  superfluously 
useless,  although  it  were  as  respectable  as  the 
Church  of  England,  the  sooner  a  man  is  out 
of  it,  the  better  for  himself  and  all  concerned. 

AFTER  all,  I  thought,  our  satirist  has  just 
gone  far  enough  into  his  neighbours  to 
find  that  the  outside  is  false,  without  caring  to 
go  farther  and  discover  what  is  really  true. 
He  is  content  to  find  that  things  are  not  what 
they  seem,  and   broadly  generalises  from  it 
that  they  do  not  exist  at  all.      He  sees  our 
virtues  are  not  what  they  pretend  they  are; 
144 


and,  on  the  strength  of  that,  he  denies  us  the 
possession  of  virtue  altogether.  He  has  learned 
the  first  lesson,  that  no  man  is  wholly  good ; 
but  he  has  not  even  suspected  that  there  is 
another  equally  true,  to  wit,  that  no  man  is 
wholly  bad. 

OR  take  the  case  of  men  of  letters.  Every 
piece  of  work  which  is  not  as  good 
as  you  can  make  it,  which  you  have  palmed 
off  imperfect,  meagrely  thought,  niggardly  in 
execution,  upon  mankind,  who  is  your  pay- 
master on  parole,  and  in  a  sense  your  pupil, 
every  hasty  or  slovenly  or  untrue  performance, 
should  rise  up  against  you  in  the  court  of  your 
own  heart  and  condemn  you  for  a  thief. 

C  YMPATHY  is  a  thing  to  be  encouraged, 
*-*  apart  from  humane  considerations,  be- 
cause it  supplies  us  with  the  materials  for 
wisdom.  It  is  probably  more  instructive  to 
entertain  a  sneaking  kindness  for  any  un- 
popular person  .  .  .  than  to  give  way  to 
perfect  raptures  of  moral  indignation  against 
his  abstract  vices, 

T  N  the  best  fabric  of  duplicity  there  is  some 
•*•  weak  point,  if  you  can  strike  it,  which 
will  loosen  all. 

IT  is  at  best  but  a  pettifogging,  pickthank 
business  to  decompose  actions  into  little 
personal  motives,  and  explain  heroism  away. 
K  I4S 


The  Abstract  Bagman  will  grow  like  an 
Admiral  at  heart,  not  by  ungrateful  carping, 
but  in  a  heat  of  admiration. 

A  FTER  an  hospital,  what  uglier  piece  is 
*"*•  there  in  civilisation  than  a  court  of  law  ? 
Hither  come  envy,  malice,  and  all  uncharitable- 
ness  to  wrestle  it  out  in  public  tourney;  crimes, 
broken  fortunes,  severed  households,  the  knave 
and  his  victim,  gravitate  to  this  low  building 
with  the  arcade.  To  how  many  has  not  St. 
Giles's  bell  told  the  first  hour  after  ruin?  I 
think  I  see  them  pause  to  count  the  strokes 
and  wander  on  again  into  the  moving  High 
Street,  stunned  and  sick  at  heart. 

/T*HERE  are  two  things  that  men  should 
•^       never  weary  of — goodness  and  humility. 

T  T  is  not  enough  to  have  earned  our  liveli- 
•*•  hood.  Either  the  earning  itself  should 
have  been  serviceable  to  mankind,  or  some- 
thing else  must  follow.  To  live  is  sometimes 
very  difficult,  but  it  is  never  meritorious  in 
itself;  and  we  must  have  a  reason  to  allege  to 
our  own  conscience  why  we  should  continue 
to  exist  upon  this  crowded  earth.  If  Thoreau 
had  simply  dwelt  in  his  house  at  Walden,  a 
lover  of  trees,  birds,  and  fishes,  and  the  open 
air  and  virtue,  a  reader  of  wise  books,  an  idle, 
selfish  self-improver,  he  would  have  managed 
to  cheat  Admetus,  but,  to  cling  to  metaphor, 
146 


the  devil  would  have  had  him  in  the  end. 
Those  who  can  avoid  toil  altogether  and  dwell 
in  the  Arcadia  of  private  means,  and  even 
those  who  can,  by  abstinence,  reduce  the 
necessary  amount  of  it  to  some  six  weeks  a 
year,  having  the  more  liberty,  have  only  the 
higher  moral  obligation  to  be  up  and  doing  in 
the  interest  of  man. 


A  MAN  may  have  done  well  for  years,  and 
*"*•  then  he  may  fail ;  he  will  hear  of  his 
failure.  Or  he  may  have  done  well  for  years, 
and  still  do  well,  but  the  critic  may  have  tired 
of  praising  him,  or  there  may  have  sprung  up 
some  new  idol  of  the  instant,  some  'dust  a 
little  gilt,'  to  whom  they  now  prefer  to  offer 
sacrifice.  Here  is  the  obverse  and  the  reverse 
of  that  empty  and  ugly  thing  called  popularity 
Will  any  man  suppose  it  worth  gaining  ? 


A  MONG  sayings  that  have  a  currency  in 
•^"^  spite  of  behg  wholly  false  upon  the 
face  of  them  for  the  sake  of  a  half-truth  upon 
another  subject  which  is  accidentally  combined 
with  the  error,  one  of  the  grossest  and  broadest 
conveys  the  monstrous  proposition  that  it  is 
easy  to  tell  the  truth  and  hard  to  tell  a  lie.  I 
wish  heartily  it  were.  But  the  truth  is  one : 
it  has  first  to  be  discovered,  then  justly  and 
exactly  uttered, 

147 


T^OR  such  things  as  honour  and  love  and 
•*•  faith  are  not  only  nobler  than  food  and 
drink,  but  indeed  I  think  that  we  desire  them 
more,  and  suffer  more  sharply  for  their 
absence. 


'T^HERE  is  a  strong  feeling  in  favour  of 
-••  cowardly  and  prudential  proverbs.  The 
sentiments  of  a  man  while  he  is  full  of  ardour 
and  hope  are  to  be  received,  it  is  supposed, 
with  some  qualification.  But  when  the  same 
person  has  ignominiously  failed  and  begins  to 
eat  up  his  words,  he  should  be  listened  to  like 
an  oracle.  Most  of  our  pocket  wisdom  is 
conceived  for  the  use  of  mediocre  people,  to 
discourage  them  from  ambitious  attempts,  and 
generally  console  them  in  their  mediocrity. 
And  since  mediocre  people  constitute  the  bulk 
of  humanity,  this  is  no  doubt  very  properly  so. 
But  it  does  not  follow  that  the  one  sort  of 
proposition  is  any  less  true  than  the  other,  or 
that  Icarus  is  not  to  be  more  praised,  and 
perhaps  more  envied,  than  Mr.  Samuel 
Budgett  the  successful  merchant. 


'"V^OU  know  it  very  well,  it  cannot  in  any 
•*•       way  help  that  you  should  brood  upon 
it,  and  I  sometimes  wonder  whether  you  and  I 
— who  are  a  pair  of  sentimentalists — are  quite 
good  judges  of  plain  men.' 
148 


TpOR,  after  all,  we  are  vessels  of  a  very 
limited  content.  Not  all  men  can  read 
all  books  ;  it  is  only  in  a  chosen  few  that  any 
man  will  find  his  appointed  food  ;  and  the 
fittest  lessons  are  the  most  palatable,  and 
make  themselves  welcome  to  the  mind. 

T  T  is  all  very  fine  to  talk  about  tramps  and 
•*•  morality.  Six  hours  of  police  surveillance 
(such  as  I  have  had)  or  one  brutal  rejection 
from  an  inn-door  change  your  views  upon  the 
subject  like  a  course  of  lectures.  As  long  as 
you  keep  in  the  upper  regions,  with  all  the 
world  bowing  to  you  as  you  go,  social  arrange- 
ments have  a  very  handsome  air ;  but  once 
get  under  the  wheels  and  you  wish  society 
were  at  the  devil.  I  will  give  most  respectable 
men  a  fortnight  of  such  a  life,  and  then  I  will 
offer  them  twopence  for  what  remains  of  their 
morality. 

T  HATE  cynicism  a  great  deal  worse  than  I 
A  do  the  devil  ;  unless,  perhaps,  the  two 
were  the  same  thing  ?  And  yet  'tis  a  good 
tonic ;  the  cold  tub  and  bath-towel  of  the 
sentiments  ;  and  positively  necessary  to  life 
in  cases  of  advanced  sensibility. 

1Y/T  OST  men,  finding  themselves  the  authors 
•*•     of  their  own  disgrace,  rail  the  louder 
against   God   or   destiny.      Most   men,  when 
they  repent,  oblige  their  friends  to  share  the 
bitterness  of  that  repentance. 
149 


•p\ELAY,  they  say,  begetteth  peril;  but  it 
*-'     is  rather  this  itch  of  doing  that  undoes 


man  has  a  sane  spot  somewhere. 


is  never  a  bad   wind   that  blows 
where  we  want  to  go. 


T  T  is  a  great  thing  if  you  can  persuade 
•*•  people  that  they  are  somehow  or  other 
partakers  in  a  mystery.  It  makes  them  feel 
bigger. 

"D  UT  it  is  an  evil  age  for  the  gypsily  inclined 
-^  among  men.  He  who  can  sit  squarest 
on  a  three-legged  stool,  he  it  is  who  has  the 
wealth  and  glory. 

T^OR  truth  that  is  suppressed  by  friends  is 
the  readiest  weapon  of  the  enemy. 

"OUT  O,  what  a  cruel  thing  is  a  farce  to 
-*-'  those  engaged  in  it  1 

T  T  is  not  always  the  most  faithful  believer 
•^  who  makes  the  cunningest  apostle. 


cunningest  apostl 

ard  ;    in    s 
cases  it  outlives  the  man. 


VANITY   dies   hard  ;    in    some    obstinate 


A     MAN  may  live  in  dreams,  and  yet  be 
•**•    unprepared  for  their  realisation. 

8  ~DE  soople,  Davie,  in  things  immaterial.' 


"VI O  class  of  man  is  altogether  bad  ;  but  each 
•*•  ^      has  its  own  faults  and  virtues. 


"D  UT  it  is  odd  enough,  the  very  women  who 
•^  profess  most  contempt  for  mankind  as  a 
sex  seem  to  find  even  its  ugliest  particulars 
rather  lively  and  high-minded  in  their  own 
sons. 

/~pO  cling  to  what  is  left  of  any  damaged 
-*•       quality  is  virtue  in  the  man. 

"DUT  we  have  no  bravery  nowadays,  and, 
even  in  books,  must  all  pretend  to  be  as 
dull  and  foolish  as  our  neighbours. 

T  T  always  warms  a  man  to  see  a  woman 
1  brave. 

/CONDESCENSION  is  an  excellent  thing, 
^-^  but  it  is  strange  how  one-sided  the 
pleasure  of  it  is  I 

OOME  strand  of  our  own  misdoing  is 
*-*  involved  in  every  quarrel. 


*~pHERE  was  never  an  ill  thing  made  better 
A       by  meddling. 

T    ET  any  man  speak  long  enough,  he  will 
•^    get  believers. 


VERY    one   lives   by   selling  something, 

*     whatever  be  his  right  to  it. 


A 
D 


MAN  dissatisfied  with  endeavour  is  a  man 
tempted  to  sadness. 

RAMA  is  the  poetry  of  conduct,  romance 
the  poetry  of  circumstance. 


TT  is  one  of  the  most  common  forms  of 
•*•  depreciation  to  throw  cold  water  on  the 
whole  by  adroit  over-commendation  of  a  part, 
since  everything  worth  judging,  whether  it  be 
a  man,  a  work  of  art,  or  only  a  fine  city,  must 
be  judged  upon  its  merits  as  a  whole. 

T  WONDER,  would  a  negative  be  found 
•*•  enticing?  for,  from  the  negative  point  of 
view,  I  flatter  myself  this  volume  has  a  certain 
stamp.  Although  it  runs  to  considerably  over 
a  hundred  pages,  it  contains  not  a  single 
reference  to  the  imbecility  of  God's  universe, 
nor  so  much  as  a  single  hint  that  I  could  have 
made  a  better  one  myself — I  really  do  nptknow 
where  my  head  can  have  ' 


T  T'S  deadly  commonplace,  but,  after  all,  the 
•*•  commonplaces  are  the  great  poetic  truths. 

/rF*HOSE  who  try  to  be  artists  use,  time  after 
•*•  time,  the  matter  of  their  recollections, 
setting  and  resetting  little  coloured  memories 
of  men  and  scenes,  rigging  up  (it  may  be)  some 
especial  friend  in  the  attire  of  a  buccaneer,  and 
decreeing  armies  to  manoeuvre,  or  murder  to 
be  done,  on  the  playground  of  their  youth. 
But  the  memories  are  a  fairy  gift  which  cannot 
be  worn  out  in  using.  After  a  dozen  services 
in  various  tales,  the  little  sunbright  pictures  of 
the  past  still  shine  in  the  mind's  eye  with  not 
a  lineament  defaced,  not  a  tint  impaired. 
Cluck  und  ungluck  wird  gesangt  if  Goethe 
pleases;  yet  only  by  endless  avatars,  the 
original  re-embodying  after  each.  So  that  a 
writer,  in  time,  begins  to  wonder  at  the  perdur- 
able life  of  these  impressions  ;  begins,  perhaps, 
to  fancy  that  he  wrongs  them  when  he  weaves 
them  in  with  fiction ;  and  looking  back  on 
them  with  ever-growing  kindness,  puts  them 
at  last,  substantive  jewels,  in  a  setting  of  their 
own. 

T)LACE  them  in  a  hospital,  put  them  in  a 
•*•  jail  in  yellow  overalls,  do  what  you  will, 
young  Jessamy  finds  young  Jenny. 

'  ~V7"OU  fret  against  the  common  law,'  I  said. 
'  You  rebel  against  the  voice  of  God, 
which  He  has  made  so  winning  to  convince,  so 
153 


Imperious  to  command.  Hear  it,  and  how  it 
speaks  between  us !  Your  hand  clings  to 
mine,  your  heart  leaps  at  my  touch,  the  un- 
known elements  of  which  we  are  compounded 
awake  and  run  together  at  a  look  ;  the  clay  of 
the  earth  remembers  its  independent  life,  and 
yearns  to  join  us ;  we  are  drawn  together  as 
the  stars  are  turned  about  in  space,  or  as  the 
tides  ebb  and  flow  ;  by  things  older  and  greater 
than  we  ourselves.' 

«  /~\LALLA,'  I  said,  'the  soul  and  the  body 
^-^  are  one,  and  mostly  so  in  love.  What 
the  body  chooses,  the  soul  loves ;  where  the 
body  clings,  the  soul  cleaves ;  body  for  body, 
soul  to  soul,  they  come  together  at  God's 
signal ;  and  the  lower  part  (if  we  can  call 
aught  low)  is  only  the  footstool  and  foundation 
of  the  highest* 

OHE  sent  me  away,  and  yet  I  had  but  to 
**^  call  upon  her  name  and  she  came  to  me. 
These  were  but  the  weaknesses  of  girls,  from 
which  even  she,  the  strangest  of  her  sex,  was 
not  exempted. 

TTj*  OR  even  in  love  there  are  unlovely  hum- 
•*•  ours ;  ambiguous  acts,  unpardonable 
words,  may  yet  have  sprung  from  a  kind 
sentiment.  If  the  injured  one  could  read  your 
heart,  you  may  be  sure  that  he  would  under- 


stand  and  pardon  ;  but,  alas  !  the  heart  cannot 
be  shown  —  it  has  to  be  demonstrated  in 
words. 

'T^HERE  is  no  greater  wonder  than  the  way 
•••  the  face  of  a  young  woman  fits  in  a 
man's  mind,  and  stays  there,  and  he  could 
never  tell  you  why  ;  it  just  seems  it  was  the 
thing  he  wanted. 


are  many  matters  in  which  you 
•*•  may  waylay  Destiny,  and  bid  him  stand 
and  deliver.  Hard  work,  high  thinking,  ad- 
venturous excitement,  and  a  great  deal  more 
that  forms  a  part  of  this  or  the  other  person's 
spiritual  bill  of  fare,  are  within  the  reach  of 
almost  any  one  who  can  dare  a  liitle  and  be 
patient.  But  it  is  by  no  means  in  the  way  of 
every  one  to  fall  in  love. 

A  wet  rag  goes  safely  by  the  fire  ;  and 
if  a  man  is  blind,  he  cannot  expect  tc  be 
much  impressed  by  romantic  scenery.  Apart 
from  all  this,  many  lovable  people  miss 
each  other  in  the  world,  or  meet  under  some 
unfavourable  star. 

TO  deal  plainly,  if  they  only  married  when 
they  fell  in  love,  most  people  would  die 
unwed  ;  and  among  the  others,  there  would 
be   not  a  few  tumultuous   households.      The 
Lion  is  the  King  of  Beasts,  but  he  is  scarcely 
155 


suitable  for  a  domestic  pet.  In  the  same  way, 
I  suspect  love  is  rather  too  violent  a  passion  to 
make,  in  all  cases,  a  good  domestic  sentiment. 
Like  other  violent  excitements,  it  throws  up 
not  only  what  is  best,  but  what  is  worst  and 
smallest,  in  men's  characters.  Just  as  some 
people  are  malicious  in  drink,  or  brawling  and 
virulent  under  the  influence  of  religious  feeling, 
some  are  moody,  jealous,  and  exacting  when 
they  are  in  love,  who  are  honest,  downright, 
good-hearted  fellows  enough  in  the  everyday 
affairs  and  humours  of  the  world. 

THERE  is  only  one  event  in  life  which 
really  astonishes  a  man  and  startles  him 
out  of  his  prepared  opinions.  Everything  else 
befalls  him  very  much  as  he  expected.  Event 
succeeds  to  event,  with  an  agreeable  variety 
indeed,  but  with  little  that  is  either  startling 
or  intense ;  they  form  together  no  more  than 
a  sort  of  background,  or  running  accompani- 
ment to  the  man's  own  reflections ;  and  he 
falls  naturally  into  a  cool,  curious,  and  smiling 
habit  of  mind,  and  builds  himself  up  in  a  con- 
ception of  life  which  expects  to-morrow  to  be 
after  the  pattern  of  to-day  and  yesterday.  He 
may  be  accustomed  to  the  vagaries  of  his 
friend  and  acquaintances  under  the  influence  of 
love.  He  may  sometime  look  forward  to  it 
for  himself  with  an  incomprehensible  expecta- 
tion. But  it  is  a  subject  in  which  neither 
intuition  nor  the  behaviour  of  others  will  help 
156 


the  philosopher  to  the  truth.  There  is  pro- 
bably nothing  rightly  thought  or  rightly  written 
on  this  matter  of  love  that  is  not  a  piece  of  the 
person's  experience. 

IT  is  the  property  of  things  seen  for  the  first 
time,  or  for  the  first  time  after  long,  like 
the  flowers  in  spring,  to  re-awaken  in  us  the 
sharp  edge  of  sense,  and  that  impression  of 
mystic  strangeness  which  otherwise  passes  out 
of  life  with  the  coming  years  ;  but  the  sight  of 
a  loved  face  is  what  renews  a  man's  character 
from  the  fountain  upwards. 

"^TOTHING  is  given  for  nothing  in  this 
•*-^  world  ;  there  can  be  no  true  love,  even 
on  your  own  side,  without  devotion  ;  devotion 
is  the  exercise  of  love,  by  which  it  grows ;  but 
if  you  will  give  enough  of  that,  if  you  will  pay 
the  pric*  in  a  sufficient  '  amount  of  what  you 
call  life,'  why  then,  indeed,  whether  with  wife 
or  comrade,  you  may  have  months  and  even 
years  of  such  easy,  natural,  pleasurable,  and 
yet  improving  intercourse  as  shall  make  time 
a  moment  and  kindness  a  delight. 

T  OVE  is  not  blind,  nor  yet  forgiving.  '  O 
"^  yes,  believe  me,'  as  the  song  says, 
'  Love  has  eyes  ! '  The  nearer  the  intimacy, 
the  more  cuttingly  do  we  feel  the  unworthiness 
of  those  we  love  ;  and  because  you  love  one, 
and  would  die  for  that  love  to-morrow,  you 
have  not  forgiven,  and  you  never  will  forgive, 
157 


that  friend's  misconduct.  If  you  want  8 
person's  faults,  go  to  those  who  love  him. 
They  will  not  tell  you,  but  they  know.  And 
herein  lies  the  magnanimous  courage  of  love, 
that  it  endures  this  knowledge  without  change. 

/CERTAINLY,  whatever  it  may  be  with 
^-x  regard  to  the  world  at  large,  this  idea  of 
beneficent  pleasure  is  true  as  between  the 
sweethearts.  To  do  good  and  communicate 
is  the  lover's  grand  intention.  It  is  the  happi- 
ness of  the  other  that  makes  his  own  most 
intense  gratification.  It  is  not  possible  to 
disentangle  the  different  emotions,  the  pride, 
humility,  pity,  and  passion,  which  are  excited 
by  a  look  of  happy  love  or  an  unexpected 
caress.  To  make  one's  self  beautiful,  to  dress 
the  hair,  to  excel  in  talk,  to  do  anything  and 
all  things  that  puff  out  the  character  and  attri- 
butes and  make  them  imposing  in  the  eyes  of 
others,  is  not  only  to  magnify  one's  self,  but 
to  offer  the  most  delicate  homage  at  the  same 
time.  And  it  is  in  this  latter  intention  that 
they  are  done  by  lovers,  for  the  essence  of 
love  is  kindness  ;  and,  indeed,  it  may  be  best 
defined  as  passionate  kindness ;  kindness,  so 
to  speak,  run  mad  and  become  importunate 
and  violent. 

"\17HAT  sound  is  so  full  of  music  as  one's 
•  •       own  name  uttered  for  the  first  time  in 
the  voice  of  her  we  love  ! 


"\  1  J"E  make  love,  and  thereby  ourselves  fall 

*  the  deeper  in  it.     It  is  with  the  heart 
only  that  one  captures  a  heart. 

S~\  HAVE  it  your  own  way  ;  I  am  too  old 
^-^  )  a  hand  to  argue  with  young  gentlemen 
who  choose  to  fancy  themselves  in  love  j  I 
have  too  much  experience,  thank  you. 

A  ND  love,  considered  as  a  spectacle,  must 
•^"^  have  attractions  for  many  who  are  not 
of  the  confraternity.  The  sentimental  old 
maid  is  a  commonplace  of  the  novelists ;  and 
he  must  be  rather  a  poor  sort  of  human  being, 
to  be  sure,  who  can  look  on  at  this  pretty 
madness  without  indulgence  and  sympathy. 
For  nature  commends  itself  to  people  with  a 
most  insinuating  art ;  the  busiest  is  now  ana 
again  arrested  by  a  great  sunset ;  and  you 
may  be  as  pacific  or  as  cold-blooded  as  you 
will,  but  you  cannot  help  some  emotion  when 
you  read  of  well-disputed  battles,  or  meet  a 
pair  of  lovers  in  the  lane. 

JEALOUSY,    at  any  rate,   is  one  of  the 
consequences  of  love  ;  you  may  like  it  or 
not,  at  pleasure  ;  but  there  it  is. 

"\17ITH  our  chosen  friends,  on  the  other 

*  *       hand,  and  still  more   between  lovers 
(for  mutual  understanding  is  love's  essence), 
the  truth  is  easily  indicated  by  the  one  and 
aj>tly  comprehended  by  the  other.      A  hint 

159 


taken,  a  look  understood,  conveys  the  gist  of 
long  and  delicate  explanations ;  and  where 
the  life  is  known  even  yea  and  nay  become 
luminous.  In  the  closest  of  all  relations — 
that  of  a  love  well  founded  and  equally  shared 
— speech  is  half  discarded,  like  a  roundabout, 
infantile  process  or  a  ceremony  of  formal 
etiquette  ;  and  the  two  communicate  directly 
by  their  presences,  and  with  few  looks  and 
fewer  words  contrive  to  share  their  good  and 
evil  and  uphold  each  other's  hearts  in  joy. 

A  ND  yet  even  while  I  was  exulting  in  my 
•^"^  solitude  I  became  aware  of  a  strange 
lack.  I  wished  a  companion  to  lie  near  me 
in  the  starlight,  silent  and  not  moving,  but 
ever  within  touch.  For  there  is  a  fellowship 
more  quiet  even  than  solitude,  and  which, 
rightly  understood,  is  solitude  made  perfect. 
And  to  live  out  of  doors  with  the  woman  a 
man  loves  is  of  all  lives  the  most  complete 
and  free. 

/T*HE  flower  of  the  hedgerow  and  the  star 
of  heaven  satisfy  and  delight  us :  how 
much  more  the  look  of  the  exquisite  being 
who  was  created  to  bear  and  rear,  to  madden 
and  rejoice  mankind  I 

CO  strangely  are  we  built:  so  much  more 
•^  strong  is  the  love  of  woman  than  the 
mere  love  of  life. 

1 60 


*\7'OU  think  that  pity — and  the  kindred  sen- 
•*•  timents — have  the  greatest  power  upon 
the  heart.  I  think  more  nobly  of  women. 
To  my  view,  the  man  they  love  will  first  of 
all  command  their  respect ;  he  will  be  stead- 
fast— proud,  if  you  please  ;  dry — possibly — 
but  of  all  things  steadfast.  They  will  look 
at  him  in  doubt;  at  last  they  will  see  that 
stern  face  which  he  presents  to  all  of  the  rest 
of  the  world  soften  to  them  alone.  First, 
trust,  I  say.  It  is  so  that  a  woman  loves  who 
is  worthy  of  heroes. 

/T*HE  sex  likes  to  pick  up  knowledge  and 
•••  yet  preserve  its  superiority.  It  is  good 
policy,  and  almost  necessary  in  the  circum- 
stances. If  a  man  finds  a  woman  admires 
him,  were  it  only  for  his  acquaintance  with 
geography,  he  will  begin  at  once  to  build 
upon  the  admiration.  It  is  only  by  unin- 
termittent  snubbing  that  the  pretty  ones  can 
keep  us  in  our  place.  Men,  as  Miss  Howe 
or  Miss  Harlowe  would  have  said,  '  are  such 
encroachers.'  For  my  part,  I  am  body  and 
soul  with  the  women  ;  and  after  a  well-married 
couple,  there  is  nothing  so  beautiful  in  the 
world  as  the  myth  of  the  divine  huntress, 
It  is  no  use  for  a  man  to  take  to  the  woods ; 
we  know  him  ;  Anthony  tried  the  same  thing 
long  ago,  and  had  a  pitiful  time  of  it  by  all 
accounts.  But  there  is  this  about  some 
women,  which  overtops  the  best  gymnosophist 
161 


among  men,  that  they  suffice  themselves,  and 
can  walk  in  a  high  and  cold  zone  without  the 
countenance  of  any  trousered  being.  I  de- 
clare, although  the  reverse  of  a  professed 
ascetic,  I  am  more  obliged  to  women  for  this 
ideal  than  I  should  be  to  the  majority  of  them, 
or  indeed  to  any  but  one,  for  a  spontaneous 
kiss.  There  is  nothing  so  encouraging  as  the 
spectacle  of  self-sufficiency.  And  when  I 
think  of  the  slim  and  lovely  maidens,  running 
the  woods  all  night  to  the  note  of  Diana's 
horn ;  moving  among  the  old  oaks,  as  fancy- 
free  as  they ;  things  of  the  forest  and  the 
starlight,  not  touched  by  the  commotion  of 
man's  hot  and  turbid  life — although  there  are 
plenty  other  ideals  that  I  should  prefer — I 
find  my  heart  beat  at  the  thought  of  this  one. 
'Tis  to  fail  in  life,  but  to  fail  with  what  a 
grace  !  That  is  not  lost  which  is  not  regretted. 
And  where — here  slips  out  \.\\<z  male — where 
would  be  much  of  the  glory  of  inspiring  love, 
if  there  were  no  contempt  to  overcome  ? 

nPHE  drawing-room  is,  indeed,  an  artificial 
•*•  place ;  it  is  so  by  our  choice  and  for 
our  sins.  The  subjection  of  women ;  the 
ideal  imposed  upon  them  from  the  cradle,  and 
worn,  like  a  hair-shirt,  with  so  much  con- 
stancy;  their  motherly,  superior  tenderness 
to  man's  vanity  and  self-importance ;  their 
managing  arts — the  arts  of  a  civilised  slave 
among  good-natured  barbarians — are  all  pain- 
162 


ful  ingredients  and  all  help  to  falsify  relations. 
It  is  not  till  we  get  clear  of  that  amusing 
artificial  scene  that  genuine  relations  are 
founded,  or  ideas  honestly  compared.  In 
the  garden,  on  the  road  or  the  hillside,  or 
tete-&-t$tc  and  apart  from  interruptions, 
occasions  arise  when  we  may  learn  much 
from  any  single  woman  ;  and  nowhere  more 
often  than  in  married  life.  Marriage  is  one 
long  conversation,  chequered  by  disputes. 
The  disputes  are  valueless  ;  they  but  ingrain 
the  difference ;  the  heroic  heart  of  woman 
prompting  her  at  once  to  nail  her  colours  to 
the  mast.  But  in  the  intervals,  almost  un- 
consciously and  with  no  desire  to  shine,  the 
whole  material  of  life  is  turned  over  and  over, 
ideas  are  struck  out  and  shared,  the  two 
persons  more  and  more  adapt  their  notions 
one  to  suit  the  other,  and  in  process  of  time, 
without  sound  of  trumpet,  they  conduct  each 
other  into  new  worlds  of  thought. 


J7"  IRSTIE  was  now  over  fifty,  and  might 
-*• *•  have  sat  to  a  sculptor.  Long  of  limb, 
and  still  light  of  foot,  deep-breasted,  robust- 
loined,  her  golden  hair  not  yet  mingled  with 
any  trace  of  silver,  the  years  had  but  caressed 
and  embellished  her.  By  the  lines  of  a  rich 
and  vigorous  maternity,  she  seemed  destined 
to  be  the  bride  of  heroes  and  the  mother  of 
their  children. 

163 


A  ND  lastly,  he  was  dark  and  she  fair,  and 
•**•  he  was  male  and  she  female,  the  ever- 
lasting fountain  of  interest. 

'T^HE  effervescency  of  her   passionate  and 
•*•       irritable  nature  rose  within  her  at  times 
to  bursting  point.     This  is  the  price  paid  by 
age  for  unseasonable  ardours  of  feeling. 

"1 1  7EIR  must  have  supposed  his  bride  to  be 
••  somewhat  suitable;  perhaps  he  be- 
longed to  that  class  of  men  who  think  a  weak 
head  the  ornament  of  women — an  opinion 
invariably  punished  in  this  life. 

NEVER  ask  women  folk.    They  're  bound 
to  answer  'No.'     God  never  made  the 
lass  that  could  resist  the  temptation. 

IT  is  an  odd  thing  how  happily  two  people, 
if  there  are  two,  can  live  in  a  place  where 
they  have  no  acquaintance.  I  think  the 
spectacle  of  a  whole  life  in  which  you  have  no 
part  paralyses  personal  desire.  You  are  con- 
tent to  become  a  mere  spectator.  The  baker 
stands  in  his  door  ;  the  colonel  with  his  three 
medals  goes  by  to  the  cafi  at  night ;  the  troops 
drum  and  trumpet  and  man  the  ramparts  as 
bold  as  so  many  lions.  It  would  task  language 
to  say  how  placidly  you  behold  all  this.  In  a 
place  where  you  have  taken  some  root  you  are 
provoked  out  of  your  indifference  j  you  have  a 
164 


hand  in  the  game — your  friends  are  fighting 
with  the  army.  But  in  a  strange  town,  not 
small  enough  to  grow  too  soon  familiar,  nor  so 
large  as  to  have  laid  itself  out  for  travellers, 
you  stand  so  far  apart  from  the  business  that 
you  positively  forget  it  would  be  possible  to 
go  nearer  ;  you  have  so  little  human  interest 
around  you  that  you  do  not  remember  yourself 
to  be  a  man. 

T3ITY  was  her  weapon  and  her  weakness. 
•*•  To  accept  the  loved  one's  faults,  although 
it  has  an  air  of  freedom,  is  to  kiss  the  chain. 

T\ /T  ARRIAGE  is  a  step  so  grave  and  decisive 
•*•"•  that  it  attracts  light-headed,  variable 
men  by  its  very  awfulness.  They  have  been 
so  tried  among  the  inconstant  squalls  and 
currents,  so  often  sailed  for  islands  in  the  air 
or  lain  becalmed  with  burning  heart,  that  they 
will  risk  all  for  solid  ground  below  their  feet. 
Desperate  pilots,  they  run  their  sea-sick,  weary 
bark  upon  the  dashing  rocks.  It  seems  as  if 
marriage  were  the  royal  road  through  life,  and 
realised,  on  the  instant,  what  we  have  all 
dreamed  on  summer  Sundays  when  the  bells 
ring,  or  at  night  when  we  cannot  sleep  for  the 
desire  of  living.  They  think  it  will  sober  and 
change  them.  Like  those  who  join  a  brother- 
hood, they  fancy  it  needs  but  an  act  to  be  out 
of  the  coil  and  clamour  for  ever.  But  this  is 
a  wile  of  the  devil's.  To  the  end,  spring 
165 


winds  will  sow  disquietude,  passing  faces  leave 
a  regret  behind  them,  and  the  whole  world 
keep  calling  and  calling  in  their  ears.  For 
marriage  is  like  life  in  this — that  it  is  a  field  of 
battle,  and  not  a  bed  of  roses. 

"C*OR  there  is  something  in  marriage  so 
natural  and  inviting,  that  the  step  has 
an  air  of  great  simplicity  and  ease  ;  it  offers  to 
bury  for  ever  many  aching  preoccupations ;  it 
is  to  afford  us  unfailing  and  familiar  company 
through  life  ;  it  opens  up  a  smiling  prospect  of 
the  blest  and  passive  kind  of  love,  rather  than 
the  blessing  and  active ;  it  is  approached  not 
only  through  the  delights  of  courtship,  but  by 
a  public  performance  and  repeated  legal  signa- 
tures. A  man  naturally  thinks  it  will  go  hard 
within  such  august  circumvallations. 

And  yet  there  is  probably  no  other  act  in  a 
man's  life  so  hot-headed  and  foolhardy  as  this 
one  of  marriage. 

A  GAIN,  when  you  have  married  your  wife, 
'*"*•  you  would  think  you  were  got  upon  a 
hilltop,  and  might  begin  to  go  downward  by 
an  easy  slope.  But  you  have  only  ended 
courting  to  begin  marriage.  Falling  in  love 
and  winning  love  are  often  difficult  tasks  to 
overbearing  and  rebellious  spirits  ;  but  to  keep 
in  love  is  also  a  business  of  some  importance, 
to  which  both  man  and  wife  must  bring  kind- 
ness and  goodwill.  The  true  love  story  com- 
1*6 


mences  at  the  altar,  when  there  lies  before  the 
married  pair  a  most  beautiful  contest  of  wisdom 
and  generosity,  and  a  life-long  struggle  towards 
an  unattainable  ideal.  Unattainable  ?  Ay, 
surely  unattainable,  from  the  very  fact  that 
they  are  two  instead  of  one. 

"117" HEN  the  generation  is  gone,  when  the 
*  play  is  over,  when  the  thirty  years' 
panorama  has  been  withdrawn  in  tatters  from 
the  stage  of  the  world,  we  may  ask  what  has 
become  of  these  great,  weighty,  and  undying 
loves  and  the  sweethearts  who  despised  mortal 
conditions  in  a  fine  credulity  ;  and  they  can 
only  show  us  a  few  songs  in  a  bygone  taste,  a 
few  actions  worth  remembering,  and  a  few 
children  who  have  retained  some  happy  stamp 
from  the  disposition  of  their  parents. 

T_T  OPE  looks  for  unqualified  success ;  but 
Faith  counts  certainly  on  failure,  and 
takes  honourable  defeat  to  be  a  form  of  victory. 
...  In  the  first,  he  expects  an  angel  for  a 
wife ;  in  the  last,  he  knows  that  she  is  like 
himself— erring,  thoughtless,  and  untrue  ;  but 
like  himself  also,  filled  with  a  struggling 
radiancy  of  better  things,  and  adorned  with 
ineffective  qualities.  You  may  safely  go  to 
school  with  hope ;  but,  ere  you  marry,  should 
have  learned  the  mingled  lesson  of  the  world : 
that  dolls  are  stuffed  with  sawdust,  and  yet 
are  excellent  playthings  ;  that  hope  and  love 
167 


address  themselves  to  a  perfection  never 
realised,  and  yet,  firmly  held,  become  the  salt 
and  staff  of  life ;  that  you  yourself  are  com- 
pacted of  infirmities,  perfect,  you  might  say, 
in  imperfections,  and  yet  you  have  a  something 
in  you  lovable  and  worth  preserving  ;  and  that, 
while  the  mass  of  mankind  lies  under  this 
scurvy  condemnation,  you  will  scarce  find  one 
but,  by  some  generous  reading,  will  become  to 
you  a  lesson,  a  model,  and  a  noble  spouse 
through  life.  So  thinking,  you  will  constantly 
support  your  own  unworthiness,  and  easily 
forgive  the  failings  of  your  friend.  Nay,  you 
will  be  wisely  glad  that  you  retain  the  sense  of 
blemishes  ;  for  the  faults  of  married  people 
continually  spur  up  each  of  them,  hour  by 
hour,  to  do  better  and  to  meet  and  love  upon 
a  higher  ground.  And  ever,  between  the 
failures,  there  will  come  glimpses  of  kind 
virtues  to  encourage  and  console. 

"OUT  it  is  the  object  of  a  liberal  education 
•*~^  not  only  to  obscure  the  knowledge  of 
one  sex  by  another,  but  to  magnify  the  natural 
differences  between  the  two.  Man  is  a  creature 
who  lives  not  upon  bread  alone,  but  principally 
by  catchwords ;  and  the  little  rift  between 
the  sexes  is  astonishingly  widened  by  simply 
teaching  one  set  of  catchwords  to  the  girls  and 
another  to  the  boys.  To  the  first,  there  is 
shown  but  a  very  small  field  of  experience,  and 
taught  a  very  trenchant  principle  for  judgment 
168 


and  action  ;  to  the  other,  the  world  of  life  is 
more  largely  displayed,  and  their  rule  of  con- 
duct is  proportionally  widened.  They  are 
taught  to  follow  different  virtues,  to  hate 
different  vices,  to  place  their  ideal,  even  for 
each  other,  in  different  achievements.  What 
should  be  the  result  of  such  a  course  ?  When 
a  horse  has  run  away,  and  the  two  flustered 
people  in  the  gig  have  each  possessed  them- 
selves of  a  rein,  we  know  the  end  of  that  con- 
veyance will  be  in  the  ditch.  So,  when  I  see 
a  raw  youth  and  a  green  girl,  fluted  and  fiddled 
in  a  dancing  measure  into  that  most  serious 
contract,  and  setting  out  upon  life's  journey 
with  ideas  so  monstrously  divergent,  I  am  not 
surprised  that  some  make  shipwreck,  but  that 
any  come  to  port. 


who  have  a  few  intimates  are  to 
•*•  be  avoided  ;  while  those  who  swim 
loose,  who  have  their  hat  in  their  hand  all  along 
the  street,  who  can  number  an  infinity  of 
acquaintances,  and  are  not  chargeable  with 
any  one  friend,  promise  an  easy  disposition  and 
no  rival  to  the  wife's  influence.  I  will  not  say 
they  are  the  best  of  men,  but  they  are  the  stuff 
out  of  which  adroit  and  capable  women  manu- 
facture the  best  husbands. 

A     SHIP  captain  is  a  good  man  to  marry  if 

•**•     it  is  a  marriage  of  love,  for  absences  are 

a  good  influence  in  love,  and  keep  it  bright 

169 


and  delicate ;  but  he  is  just  the  worst  man  if 
the  feeling  is  more  pedestrian,  as  habit  is  too 
frequently  torn  open  and  the  solder  has  never 
time  to  set 


A  CERTAIN  sort  of  talent  is  almost  in- 
•**  dispensable  for  people  who  would  spend 
years  together  and  not  bore  themselves  to 
death.  But  the  talent,  like  the  agreement, 
must  be  for  and  about  life.  To  dwell  happily 
together,  they  should  be  versed  in  the  niceties 
of  the  heart,  and  born  with  a  faculty  for 
willing  compromise.  The  woman  must  be 
talented  as  a  woman,  and  it  will  not  much 
matter  although  she  is  talented  in  nothing  else. 
She  must  know  her  mtiier  defemme,  and  have 
a  fine  touch  for  the  affections.  And  it  is  more 
important  that  a  person  should  be  a  good 
gossip,  and  talk  pleasantly  and  smartly  of 
common  friends  and  the  thousand  and  one 
nothings  of  the  day  and  hour,  than  that  she 
should  speak  with  the  tongues  of  men  and 
angels ;  for  a  while  together  by  the  fire 
happens  more  frequently  in  marriage  than 
the  presence  of  a  distinguished  foreigner  to 
dinner.  .  ,  .  You  could  read  Kant  by  yourself, 
if  you  wanted  ;  but  you  must  share  a  joke  with 
some  one  else.  You  can  forgive  people  who 
do  not  follow  you  through  a  philosophical 
disquisition ;  but  to  find  your  wife  laughing 
when  you  had  tears  in  your  eyes,  or  staring 
170 


when  you  were  in  a  fit  of  laughter,  would 
go  some  way  towards  a  dissolution  of  the 
marriage. 


this  is  where  there  should  be  com- 
•^  ^  munity  between  man  and  wife.  They 
should  be  agreed  on  their  catchword  in  facts 
of  religion,  or  facts  of  science,  or  society,  my 
dear  ;  for  without  such  an  agreement  all  inter- 
course is  a  painful  strain  upon  the  mind.  .  .  . 
For  there  are  differences  which  no  habit  nor 
affection  can  reconcile,  and  the  Bohemian 
must  not  intermarry  with  the  Pharisee. 
Imagine  Consuelo  as  Mrs.  Samuel  Budgett, 
the  wife  of  the  successful  merchant  !  The 
best  of  men  and  the  best  of  women  may 
sometimes  live  together  all  their  lives,  andt 
for  want  of  some  consent  on  fundamental 
questions,  hold  each  other  lost  spirits  to  the 
end. 

TV/I"  ARRIAGE  is  of  so  much  use  to  women, 
^^-  opens  out  to  her  so  much  more  of  life, 
and  puts  her  in  the  way  of  so  much  more  free- 
dom and  usefulness,  that,  whether  she  marry 
ill  or  well,  she  can  hardly  miss  some  benefit. 
It  is  true,  however,  that  some  of  the  merriest 
and  most  genuine  of  women  are  old  maids  ; 
and  that  those  old  maids,  and  wives  who  are 
unhappily  married,  have  often  most  of  the 
true  motherly  touch. 

171 


*T*HE  fact  is,  we  are  much  more  afraid  of 
•*•  life  than  our  ancestors,  and  cannot  find 
it  in  our  hearts  either  to  marry  or  not  to  marry. 
Marriage  is  terrifying,  but  so  is  a  cold  and 
forlorn  old  age.  People  who  share  a  cell  in 
the  Bastile,  or  are  thrown  together  on  an  un- 
inhabited isle,  if  they  do  not  immediately  fall 
to  fisticuffs,  will  find  some  possible  ground  of 
compromise.  They  will  learn  each  other's 
ways  and  humours,  so  as  to  know  where  they 
must  go  warily,  and  where  they  may  lean  their 
whole  weight.  The  discretion  of  the  first 
years  becomes  the  settled  habit  of  the  last; 
and  so,  with  wisdom  and  patience,  two  lives 
may  grow  indissolubly  into  one. 


'"\17ELL,  an  ye  like  maids  so  little,  y'are 
*  ^  no  true  natural  man  ;  for  God  made 
them  twain  by  intention,  and  brought  true 
love  into  the  world,  to  be  man's  hope  and 
woman's  comfort.' 


r~pHERE  are  no  persons   so    far   away    as 
•*-       those     who     are     both     married     and 
estranged,  so  that  they  seem  out  of  earshot, 
or  to  have  no  common  tongue. 

TV/I"  Y  idea  of  man's  chief  end  was  to  enrich 
the  world  with  things  of  beauty,  and 
have  a  fairly  good  time  myself  while  doing  so. 
172 


"DUT  the  gymnast  is  not  my  favourite;  he 
has  little  or  no  tincture  of  the  artist  in 
his  composition  ;  his  soul  is  small  and  pedes- 
trian, for  the  most  part,  since  his  profession 
makes  no  call  upon  it,  and  does  not  accustom 
him  to  high  ideas.  But  if  a  man  is  only  so 
much  of  an  actor  that  he  can  stumble  through 
a  farce,  he  is  made  free  of  a  new  order  of 
thoughts.  He  has  something  else  to  think 
about  beside  the  money-box.  He  has  a  pride 
of  his  own,  and,  what  is  of  far  more  importance, 
he  has  an  aim  before  him  that  he  can  never 
quite  attain.  He  has  gone  upon  a  pilgrimage 
that  will  last  him  his  life  long,  because  there  is 
no  end  to  it  short  of  perfection.  He  will  better 
himself  a  little  day  by  day  ;  or,  even  if  he  has 
given  up  the  attempt,  he  will  always  remember 
that  once  upon  a  time  he  had  conceived  this 
high  ideal,  that  once  upon  a  time  he  fell  in 
love  with  a  star.  '  'Tis  better  to  have  loved 
and  lost.'  Although  the  moon  should  have 
nothing  to  say  to  Endymion,  although  he 
should  settle  down  with  Audrey  and  feed  pigs, 
do  you  not  think  he  would  move  with  a  better 
grace  and  cherish  higher  thoughts  to  the  end  ? 
The  louts  he  meets  at  church  never  had  a  fancy 
above  Audrey's  snood  ;  but  there  is  a  reminis- 
cence in  Endymion's  heart  that,  like  a  spice, 
keeps  it  fresh  and  haughty. 


173 


pEOPLE  usually  do  things  and  suffer 
•*•  martyrdom,  because  they  have  an  incli- 
nation that  way.  The  best  artist  is  not  the 
man  who  fixes  his  eye  on  posterity,  but  the 
one  who  loves  the  practice  of  his  art.  And 
instead  of  having  a  taste  for  being  successful 
merchants  and  retiring  at  thirty,  some  people 
have  a  taste  for  high  and  what  we  call  heroic 
forms  of  excitement. 

HTHESE  are  predestined  ;  if  a  man  love  the 
•*•       labour   of  any   trade,   apart   from   any 
question  of  success  or  fame,   the  gods   have 
called  him. 

THE  incommunicable  thrill  of  things,  that 
is  the  tuning-fork  by  which  we  test  the 
flatness  of  our   art.     Here  it  is  that  Nature 
teaches  and  condemns,  and  still  spurs  us  up  to 
further  effort  and  new  failure. 

/T*O  please  is  to  serve ;  and  so  far  from  its 
^-       being    difficult    to    instruct   while   you 
amuse,  it  is  difficult  to  do  the  one  thoroughly 
without  the  other. 

"\  1  J"E  shall  never  learn  the  affinities  of  beauty, 
•  •       for  they  lie  too  deep  in  nature  and  too 
far  back  in  the  mysterious  history  of  man. 

"V/T IRTH,    lyric    mirth,    and    a   vivacious 
•*^-*-     classical  contentment  are  of  the  very 
essence  of  the  better  kind  of  art. 
174 


HP  HIS  is  the  particular  crown  and  triumph 
•*•       of  the  artist — not  to  be  true  merely,  but 
to  be  lovable ;  not  simply  to  convince,  but  to 
enchant. 

T  IFE  is  hard  enough  for  poor  mortals, 
-'— '  without  having  it  indefinitely  embittered 
for  them  by  bad  art. 

CO  that  the  first  duty  of  any  man  who  is  to 
*^  write  is  intellectual.  Designedly  or  not, 
he  has  so  far  set  himself  up  for  a  leader  in  the 
minds  of  men  ;  and  he  must  see  that  his  own 
mind  is  kept  supple,  charitable,  and  bright. 
Everything  but  prejudice  should  find  a  voice 
through  him  ;  he  should  see  the  good  in  all 
things  ;  where  he  has  even  a  fear  that  he  does 
not  wholly  understand,  there  he  should  be 
wholly  silent  ;  and  he  should  recognise  from 
the  first  that  he  has  only  one  tool  in  his 
workshop,  and  that  tool  is  sympathy. 

'T^HROUGH  no  art  beside  the  art  of  words 
•*•  can  the  kindness  of  a  man's  affections 
be  expressed.  In  the  cuts  you  shall  find 
faithfully  paraded  the  quaintness  and  the 
power,  the  triviality  and  the  surprising  fresh- 
ness of  the  author's  fancy  ;  there  you  shall  find 
him  outstripped  in  ready  symbolism  and  the 
art  of  bringing  things  essentially  invisible 
before  the  eyes:  but  to  feel  the  contact  of 
175 


essential  goodness,  to  be  made  in  love  with 
piety,  the  book  must  be  read  and  not  the 
prints  examined. 

A  ND  then  I  had  an  idea  for  John  Silver 
•"*•  from  which  I  promised  myself  funds  of 
entertainment :  to  take  an  admired  friend  of 
mine  (whom  the  reader  very  likely  knows  and 
admires  as  much  as  I  do),  to  deprive  him  of  all 
his  finer  qualities  and  higher  graces  of  tempera- 
ment, to  leave  him  with  nothing  but  his 
strength,  his  courage,  his  quickness,  and  his 
magnificent  geniality,  and  to  try  to  express 
these  in  terms  of  the  culture  of  a  raw  tarpaulin, 
such  physical  surgery  is,  I  think,  a  common 
way  of  '  making  character  ' ;  perhaps  it  is, 
indeed,  the  only  way.  We  can  put  in  the 
quaint  figure  that  spoke  a  hundred  words  with 
us  yesterday  by  the  wayside  ;  but  do  we  know 
him  ?  Our  friend  with  his  infinite  variety  and 
flexibility,  we  know — but  can  we  put  him  in  ? 
Upon  the  first,  we  must  engraft  secondary  and 
imaginary  qualities,  possibly  all  wrong  ;  from 
the  second,  knife  in  hand,  we  must  cut  away 
and  deduct  the  needless  arborescence  of  his 
nature,  but  the  trunk  and  the  few  branches 
that  remain  we  may  at  least  be  fairly  sure  of. 

(  T  N  anything  fit  to  be  called  by  the  name  of 

/  *•     reading,    the    process    itself  should    be 

(absorbing   and  voluptuous;   we  should  gloat 

over  a  book,  be  rapt  clean  out  of  ourselves, 

176 


and  rise  from  the  perusal,  our  mind  filled  with 
the  busiest,  kaleidoscopic  dance  of  images, 
incapable  of  sleep  or  of  continuous  thought. 
The  words,  if  the  book  be  eloquent,  should 
run  thenceforward  in  our  ears  like  the  noise  of 
breakers,  and  the  story,  if  it  be  a  story,  repeat 
itself  in  a  thousand  coloured  pictures  to  the 
eye. 

/T"*HE  obvious  is  not  of  necessity  the  normal ; 
A  fashion  rules  and  deforms  ;  the  majority 
fall  tamely  into  the  contemporary  shape,  and 
thus  attain,  in  the  eyes  of  the  true  observer, 
only  a  higher  power  of  insignificance  ;  and  the 
danger  is  lest,  in  seeking  to  draw  the  normal, 
a  man  should  draw  the  null,  and  write  the 
novel  of  society  instead  of  the  romance  ot 
man. 

'"pHERE  is  a  kind  of  gaping  admiration  that 
•*•  would  fain  roll  Shakespeare  and  Bacon 
into  one,  to  have  a  bigger  thing  to  gape  at ; 
and  a  class  of  men  who  cannot  edit  one  author 
without  disparaging  all  others. 

OTYLE  is  the  invariable  mark  of  any 
•^  master;  and  for  the  student  who  does 
not  aspire  so  high  as  to  be  numbered  with  the 
giants,  it  is  still  the  one  quality  in  which  he 
may  improve  himself  at  will.  Passion,  wisdom, 
creative  force,  the  power  of  mystery  or  colour, 
are  allotted  in  the  hour  of  birth,  and  can  be 
M  177 


neither  learned  nor  stimulated.  But  the  just 
and  dexterous  use  of  what  qualities  we  have, 
the  proportion  of  one  part  to  another  and  to 
the  whole,  the  elision  of  the  useless,  the 
accentuation  of  the  important,  and  the  pre- 
servation of  a  uniform  character  end  to  end — 
these,  which  taken  together  constitute  technical 
perfection,  are  to  some  degree  within  the 
reach  of  industry  and  intellectual  courage. 

'T^HE  love  of  words  and  not  a  desire  to 
•••  publish  new  discoveries,  the  love  of 
form  and  not  a  novel  reading  of  historical 
events,  mark  the  vocation  of  the  writer  and 
the  painter. 

'T%HE  life  of  the  apprentice  to  any  art  is 
•*•  both  unstrained  and  pleasing ;  it  is 
strewn  with  small  successes  in  the  midst  of  a 
career  of  failure,  patiently  supported ;  the 
heaviest  scholar  is  conscious  of  a  certain 
progress ;  and  if  he  come  not  appreciably 
nearer  to  the  art  of  Shakespeare,  grows  letter- 
perfect  in  the  domain  of  A-B,  ab. 

/T*HE  fortune  of  a  tale  lies  not  alone  in  the 

•*•       skill  of  him  that  writes,  but  as  much, 

perhaps,   in  the   inherited  experience  of  him 

who  reads ;  and  when  I  hear  with  a  particular 

thrill  of  things  that  I  have  never  done  or  seen, 

it   is   one   of  that   innumerable   army   of  my 

ancestors    rejoicing    in    past    deeds.       Thus 

178 


novels  begin  to  toucn  not  the  fine  dilettanti 
but  the  gross  mass  of  mankind,  when  they 
leave  off  to  speak  of  parlours  and  shades  of 
manner  and  still-born  niceties  of  motive,  and 
begin  to  deal  with  fighting,  sailoring,  ad- 
venture, death  or  childbirth  ;  and  thus  ancient 
outdoor  crafts  and  occupations,  whether  Mr. 
Hardy  wields  the  shepherd's  crook  or  Count 
Tolstoi  swings  the  scythe,  lift  romance  into  a 
near  neighbourhood  with  epic.  These  aged 
things  have  on  them  the  dew  of  man's  morn- 
ing ;  they  lie  near,  not  so  much  to  us,  the 
semi-artificial  flowerets,  as  to  the  trunk  and 
aboriginal  taproot  of  the  race.  A  thousand 
interests  spring  up  in  the  process  of  the  ages, 
and  a  thousand  perish ;  that  is  now  an 
eccentricity  or  a  lost  art  which  was  once  the 
fashion  of  an  empire ;  and  those  only  are 
perennial  matters  that  rouse  us  to-day,  and 
that  roused  men  in  all  epochs  of  the  past. 


T  ^ARTde  bien  dire  is  but  a  drawing-room 
*•*  accomplishment  unless  it  be  pressed  into 
the  service  of  the  truth.  The  difficulty  of 
literature  is  not  to  write,  but  to  write  what 
you  mean ;  not  to  affect  your  reader,  but  to 
affect  him  precisely  as  you  wish.  This  is 
commonly  understood  in  the  case  of  books  or 
set  orations;  even  hi  making  your  will,  or 
writing  an  explicit  letter,  some  difficulty  is 
admitted  by  the  world.  But  one  thing  you 
179 


can  never  make  Philistine  natures  understand; 
one  thing,  which  yet  lies  on  the  surface, 
remains  as  unseizable  to  their  wits  as  a  high 
flight  of  metaphysics  —  namely,  that  the 
business  of  life  is  mainly  carried  on  by  means 
of  this  difficult  art  of  literature,  and  according 
to  a  man's  proficiency  in  that  art  shall  be  the 
freedom  and  fulness  of  his  intercourse  with 
other  men.  Anybody,  it  is  supposed,  can 
say  what  he  means  ;  and,  in  spite  of  their 
notorious  experience  to  the  contrary,  people 
so  continue  to  suppose. 

TT^VEN  women,  who  understand  men  so 
•*"**  well  for  practical  purposes,  do  not 
know  them  well  enough  for  the  purposes  of  art. 
Take  even  the  very  best  of  their  male  creations, 
take  Tito  Melema,  for  instance,  and  you  will 
find  he  has  an  equivocal  air,  and  every  now 
and  again  remembers  he  has  a  comb  in  the 
back  of  his  head.  Of  course,  no  woman  will 
believe  this,  and  many  men  will  be  so  polite 
as  to  humour  their  incredulity. 

A  DOGMA  learned  is  only  a  new  error — 
the  old  one  was  perhaps  as  good ;  but 
a  spirit  communicated  is  a  perpetual  pos- 
session. These  best  teachers  climb  beyond 
teaching  to  the  plane  of  art ;  it  is  themselves, 
and  what  is  best  in  themselves,  that  they 
communicate. 

i  So 


IN  this  world  of  imperfections  we  gladly 
welcome  even  partial  intimacies.  And  if 
we  find  but  one  to  whom  we  can  speak  out 
our  heart  freely,  with  whom  we  can  walk  in 
love  and  simplicity  without  dissimulation,  we 
have  no  ground  of  quarrel  with  the  world  or 
God. 


T3UT  we  are  all  travellers  in  what  John 
Bunyan  calls  the  wilderness  of  this 
world — all,  too,  travellers  with  a  donkey; 
and  the  best  that  we  find  in  our  travels  is  an 
honest  friend.  He  is  a  fortunate  voyager  who 
finds  many  We  travel,  indeed,  to  find  them. 
They  are  the  end  and  the  reward  of  life.  They 
keep  us  worthy  of  ourselves;  and  when  we 
are  alone,  we  are  only  nearer  to  the  absent. 


"\  1  7"E  are  all  incompris,  only  more  or  less 
*  *  concerned  for  the  mischance ;  all 
trying  wrongly  to  do  right ;  all  fawning  at 
each  other's  feet  like  dumb,  neglected  lap- 
dogs.  Sometimes  we  catch  an  eye — this  is 
our  opportunity  in  the  ages — and  we  wag  our 
tail  with  a  poor  smile.  '  Is  that  all  ? '  All  ? 
If  you  only  knew  !  But  how  can  they  know  ? 
They  do  not  love  us ;  the  more  fools  we  to 
squander  life  on  the  indifferent. 

But  the  morality  of  the  thing,  you  will  be 
glad  to  hear,  is  excellent ;  for  it  is  only  by 
trying  to  understand  others  that  we  can  get 
182 


our  own  hearts  understood ;  and  in  matters  of 
human  feeling  the  clement  judge  is  the  most 
successful  pleader. 

'T*  HERE  is  no  friendship  so  noble,  but  it  is 
•*•  the  product  of  the  time  ;  and  a  world 
of  little  finical  observances,  and  little  frail 
proprieties  and  fashions  of  the  hour,  go  to 
make  or  to  mar,  to  stint  or  to  perfect,  the 
union  of  spirits  the  most  loving  and  the  most 
intolerant  of  such  interference.  The  trick  of 
the  country  and  the  age  steps  in  even  between 
the  mother  and  her  child,  counts  out  their 
caresses  upon  niggardly  fingers,  and  says,  in 
the  voice  of  authority,  that  this  one  thing 
shall  be  a  matter  of  confidence  between  them, 
and  this  other  thing  shall  not. 

npHERE  is  not  anything  more  bitter  than  to 
•••       lose  a  fancied  friend. 

HP  HE  habitual  liar  may  be  a  very  honest 
•*•  fellow,  and  live  truly  with  his  wife 
and  friends  ;  while  another  man  who  never 
told  a  formal  falsehood  in  his  life  may  yet 
be  himself  one  lie — heart  and  face,  from  top 
to  bottom.  This  is  the  kind  of  lie  which 
poisons  intimacy.  And,  vice  versd,  veracity 
to  sentiment,  truth  in  a  relation,  truth  to 
your  own  heart  and  your  friends,  never  to 
feign  or  falsify  emotion — that  is  the  truth 
which  makes  love  possible  and  mankind 
happy. 

tfa 


"DUT  surely  it  is  no  very  extravagant 
•*-'  opinion  that  it  is  better  to  give  than 
to  receive,  to  serve  than  to  use  our  com- 
panions ;  and,  above  all,  where  there  is  no 
question  of  service  upon  either  side,  that  it  is 
good  to  enjoy  their  company  like  a  natural 
man. 

A  MAN  who  has  a  few  friends,  or  one  who 
•**•  has  a  dozen  (if  there  be  any  one  so 
wealthy  on  this  earth),  cannot  forget  on  how 
precarious  a  base  his  happiness  reposes ;  and 
how  by  a  stroke  or  two  of  fate — a  death,  a  few 
light  words,  a  piece  of  stamped  paper,  or  a 
woman's  bright  eyes — he  may  be  left  in  a 
month  destitute  of  all. 

T  N  these  near  intimacies,  we  are  ninety- 
•••  nine  times  disappointed  in  our  beggarly 
selves  for  once  that  we  are  disappointed  in  our 
friend  ;  that  it  is  we  who  seem  most  frequently 
undeserving  of  the  love  that  unites  us ;  and 
that  it  is  by  our  friend's  conduct  that  we  are 
continually  rebuked  and  yet  strengthened  for 
a  fresh  endeavour. 

"~pHERE  are  some  pains,'  said  he,  'too 
*•       acute  for  consolation,  or  I  would  bring 
them  to  my  kind  consoler.' 

BUT  there  are  duties  which  come  before 
gratitude  and  offences  which  justly  divide 
friends,  far  more  acquaintances. 
183 


T  IFE,  though  largely,  is  not  entirely  carried 
•*— '  on  by  literature.  We  are  subject  to 
physical  passions  and  contortions ;  the  voice 
breaks  and  changes,  and  speaks  by  unconscious 
and  winning  inflections ;  we  have  legible  coun- 
tenances, like  an  open  book  ;  things  that  can- 
not be  said  look  eloquently  through  the  eyes ; 
and  the  soul,  not  locked  into  the  body  as  a 
dungeon,  dwells  ever  on  the  threshold  with 
appealing  signals.  Groans  and  tears,  looks 
and  gestures,  a  flush  or  a  paleness,  are  often 
the  most  clear  reporters  of  the  heart,  and 
speak  more  directly  to  the  hearts  of  others. 

T 1  7E  are  different  with  different  friends  ; 
•  *  yet  if  we  look  closely  we  shall  find 
that  every  such  relation  reposes  on  some  par- 
ticular apotheosis  of  oneself ;  with  each  friend, 
although  we  could  not  distinguish  it  in  words 
from  any  other,  we  have  at  least  one  special 
reputation  to  preserve  :  and  it  is  thus  that  we 
run,  when  mortified,  to  our  friend  or  the 
woman  that  we  love,  not  to  hear  ourselves 
called  better,  but  to  be  better  men  in  point  of 
fact.  We  seek  this  society  to  flatter  ourselves 
with  our  own  good  conduct.  And  hence  any 
falsehood  in  the  relation,  any  incomplete  or 
perverted  understanding,  will  spoil  even  the 
pleasure  of  these  visits. 

But  it  follows  that  since  they  are  neither  of 
them  so  good  as  the  other  hopes,  and  each  is, 
in  a  very  honest  manner,  playing  a  part  above 
184 


his  powers,  such  an  intercourse  must  often  be 
disappointing  to  both. 

IT  is  the  mark  of  a  modest  man  to  accept  his 
friendly  circle  ready-made  from  the  hands 
of  opportunity ;  and  that  was  the  lawyer's  way. 
His  friends  were  those  of  his  own  blood,  or 
those  whom  he  had  known  the  longest ;  his 
affections,  like  ivy,  were  the  growth  of  time, 
they  implied  no  aptness  in  the  object 

OF  those  who  are  to  act  influentially  on 
their  fellows,  we  should  expect  always 
something  large  and  public  in  their  way  of 
life,  something  more  or  less  urbane  and  com- 
prehensive in  their  sentiment  for  others.  We 
should  not  expect  to  see  them  spend  their 
sympathy  in  idyls,  however  beautiful.  We 
should  not  seek  them  among  those  who,  if 
they  have  but  a  wife  to  their  bosom,  ask  no 
more  of  womankind,  just  as  they  ask  no  more 
of  their  own  sex,  if  they  can  find  a  friend  or 
two  for  their  immediate  need.  They  will  be 
quick  to  feel  all  the  pleasures  of  our  associa- 
tion— not  the  great  ones  alone,  but  all.  They 
will  know  not  love  only,  but  all  those  other 
ways  in  which  man  and  woman  mutually  make 
each  other  happy — by  sympathy,  by  admira- 
tion, by  the  atmosphere  they  bear  about  them 
— down  to  the  mere  impersonal  pleasure  of 
passing  happy  faces  in  the  street.  For,  through 
all  this  gradation,  the  difference  of  sex  makes 
185 


itself  pleasurably  felt.  Down  to  the  most 
lukewarm  courtesies  of  life,  there  is  a  special 
chivalry  due  and  a  special  pleasure  received, 
when  the  two  sexes  are  brought  ever  so  lightly 
into  contact.  We  love  our  mothers  otherwise 
than  we  love  our  fathers  ;  a  sister  is  not  as  a 
brother  to  us ;  and  friendship  between  man 
and  woman,  be  it  never  so  unalloyed  and  in- 
nocent, is  not  the  same  as  friendship  between 
man  and  man.  Such  friendship  is  not  even 
possible  for  all.  To  conjoin  tenderness  for  a 
woman  that  is  not  far  short  of  passionate  with 
such  disinterestedness  and  beautiful  gratuity  of 
affection  as  there  is  between  friends  of  the 
same  sex,  requires  no  ordinary  disposition  in 
the  man.  For  either  it  would  presuppose 
quite  womanly  delicacy  of  perception,  and,  as 
it  were,  a  curiosity  in  shades  of  differing  senti- 
ment ;  or  it  would  mean  that  he  had  accepted 
the  large,  simple  divisions  of  society:  a  strong 
and  positive  spirit  robustly  virtuous,  who  has 
chosen  a  better  part  coarsely,  and  holds  to  it 
steadfastly,  with  all  its  consequences  of  pain 
to  himself  and  others ;  as  one  who  should 
go  straight  before  him  on  a  journey,  neither 
tempted  by  wayside  flowers  nor  very  scrupu- 
lous of  small  lives  under  foot. 

I   COULD  have  thought  he  had  been  eaves- 
dropping at  the  doors  of  my  heart,   so 
entire  was  the  coincidence  between  his  writing 
and  my  thought. 

186 


A  KNOWLEDuE  that  another  has  felt  at 
•**•  we  have  felt,  and  seen  things,  even  as 
they  are  little  things,  not  much  otherwise  than 
we  have  seen  them,  will  continue  to  the  end 
to  be  one  of  life's  choicest  pleasures. 

HP  HE  morning  drum-call  on  my  eager  ear 
•*•      Thrills  unforgotten  yet ;  the  morning  dew 
Lies  yet  undried  along  my  field  of  noon. 

But  now  I  pause  at  whiles  in  what  I  do, 
And  count  the  bell,  and  tremble  lest  I  hear 
(My  work  untrimmed)  the  sunset  gun  too  soon. 

THE  ground  of  all  youth's  suffering,  soli- 
tude, hysteria,  and  haunting  of  the  grave, 
is  nothing  else  than  naked,  ignorant  selfish- 
ness. It  is  himself  that  he  sees  dead ;  those 
are  his  virtues  that  are  forgotten ;  his  is  the 
vague  epitaph.  Pity  him  but  the  more,  if  pity 
be  your  cue ;  for  where  a  man  is  all  pride, 
vanity,  and  personal  aspiration,  he  goes  through 
fire  unshielded.  In  every  part  and  corner  of 
our  life,  to  lose  oneself  is  to  be  gainer ;  to 
forget  oneself  is  to  be  happy ;  and  this  poor, 
laughable,  and  tragic  fool  has  not  yet  learned 
the  rudiments ;  himself,  giant  Prometheus,  is 
still  ironed  on  the  peaks  of  Caucasus.  But  by 
and  by  his  truant  interests  will  leave  that  tor- 
tured body,  slip  abroad  and  gather  flowers. 
Then  shall  death  appear  before  him  in  an 
altered  guise  ;  no  longer  as  a  doom  peculiar  to 
1*7 


himself,  whether  fate's  crowning  injustice  01 
his  own  last  vengeance  upon  those  who  fail  to 
value  him ;  but  now  as  a  power  that  wounds 
him  far  more  tenderly,  not  without  solemn 
compensations,  taking  and  giving,  bereaving 
and  yet  storing  up. 

/T*HE  interests  of  youth  are  rarely  frank  ;  his 
•••  passions,  like  Noah's  dove,  come  home 
to  roost.  The  fare,  sensibility,  and  volume  of 
his  own  nature,  that  is  all  that  he  has  learned 
to  recognise.  The  tumultuary  and  gray  tide 
of  life,  the  empire  of  routine,  the  unrejoicing 
faces  of  his  elders,  fill  him  with  contemptuous 
surprise  ;  there  also  he  seems  to  walk  among 
the  tombs  of  spirits  ;  and  it  is  only  in  the 
course  of  years,  and  after  much  rubbing  with 
his  fellow-men,  that  he  begins  by  glimpses  to 
see  himself  from  without  and  his  fellows  from 
within :  to  know  his  own  for  one  among  the 
thousand  undenoted  countenances  of  the  city 
street,  and  to  divine  in  others  the  throb  of 
human  agony  and  hope.  In  the  meantime  he 
will  avoid  the  hospital  doors,  the  pale  faces, 
the  cripple,  the  sweet  whiff  of  chloroform — for 
there,  on  the  most  thoughtless,  the  pains  of 
others  are  burned  home  ;  but  he  will  continue 
to  walk,  in  a  divine  self-pity,  the  aisles  of  the 
forgotten  graveyard.  The  length  of  man's  life, 
which  is  endless  to  the  brave  and  busy,  is 
scorned  by  his  ambitious  thought.  He  cannot 
bear  to  have  come  for  so  little*  and  to  go  again 
188 


so  wholly.  He  cannot  bear,  above  all,  in  that 
brief  scene,  to  be  still  idle,  and  by  way  of  cure, 
neglects  the  little  that  he  has  to  do.  The 
parable  of  the  talent  is  the  brief  epitome  of 
youth.  To  believe  in  immortality  is  one 
thing,  but  it  is  first  needful  to  believe  in  life. 
Denunciatory  preachers  seem  not  to  suspect 
that  they  may  be  taken  gravely  and  in  evil 
part ;  that  young  men  may  come  to  think  of 
time  as  of  a  moment,  and  with  the  pride  of 
Satan  wave  back  the  inadequate  gift.  Yet 
here  is  a  true  peril ;  this  it  is  that  sets  them 
to  pace  the  graveyard  alleys  and  to  read, 
with  strange  extremes  of  pity  and  derision, 
the  memorials  of  the  dead. 

Books  were  the  proper  remedy:  books  of 
vivid  human  import,  forcing  upon  their  minds 
the  issues,  pleasures,  busyness,  importance,  and 
immediacy  of  that  life  in  which  they  stand ; 
books  of  smiling  or  heroic  temper,  to  excite  or 
to  console  ;  books  of  a  large  design,  shadowing 
the  complexity  of  that  game  of  consequences 
to  which  we  all  sit  down,  the  hanger-back  not 
least.  But  the  average  sermon  flees  the  point, 
disporting  itself  in  that  eternity  of  which  we 
know,  and  need  to  know,  so  little  ;  avoiding 
the  bright,  crowded,  and  momentous  fields  of 
life  where  destiny  awaits  us, 

AND  so  in  the  majority  of  cases,  a  man 
who  fancies  himself  dying  will  get  cold 
comfort  from  the  very  youthful  view  expressed 
189 


in  this  essay.  He,  as  a  living  man,  has  some 
to  help,  some  to  love,  some  to  correct  ;  it  may 
be  some  to  punish.  These  duties  cling,  not 
upon  humanity,  but  upon  the  man  himself.  It 
is  he,  not  another,  who  is  one  woman's  son 
and  a  second  woman's  husband,  and  a  third 
woman's  father.  That  life  which  began  so 
small  has  now  grown,  with  a  myriad  filaments, 
into  the  lives  of  others.  1  1  is  not  indispensable  ; 
another  will  take  the  place  and  shoulder  the 
discharged  responsibilities  ;  but  the  better  the 
man  and  the  nobler  his  purposes,  the  more 
will  he  be  tempted  to  regret  the  extinction  of 
his  powers  and  the  deletion  of  his  personality. 
To  have  lived  a  generation  is  not  only  to  have 
grown  at  home  in  that  perplexing  medium, 
but  to  have  assumed  innumerable  duties.  To 
die  at  such  an  age  has,  for  all  but  the  entirely 
base,  something  of  the  air  of  a  betrayal. 


if  death  catch  people,  like  an  open 
•*—  '  pitfall,  and  in  mid-career,  laying  out 
vast  projects,  and  planning  monstrous  founda- 
tions, flushed  with  hope,  and  their  mouths  full 
of  boastful  language,  they  should  be  at  once 
tripped  up  and  silenced  :  is  there  not  some- 
thing brave  and  spirited  in  such  a  termination? 
and  does  not  life  go  down  with  a  better  grace, 
foaming  in  full  body  over  a  precipice,  than 
miserably  straggling  to  an  end  in  sandy  deltas  ? 
When  the  Greeks  made  their  fine  saying  that 
those  whom  the  gods  love  die  young,  I  cannot 
100 


help  "believing  they  had  this  sort  of  death  also 
in  their  eye.  For,  surely,  at  whatever  age  it 
overtake  the  man,  this  is  to  die  young. 

A  ND  so  they  were  at  last  in  '  their  resting 
•**•  graves.'  So  long  as  men  do  their  duty, 
even  if  it  be  greatly  in  a  misapprehension,  they 
will  be  leading  pattern  lives ;  and  whether  or 
not  they  come  to  lie  beside  a  martyrs'  monu- 
ment, we  may  be  sure  they  will  find  a  safe 
haven  somewhere  in  the  providence  of  God. 
It  is  not  well  to  think  of  death,  unless  we 
temper  the  thought  with  that  of  heroes  who 
despised  it.  Upon  what  ground,  is  of  small 
account ;  if  it  be  only  the  bishop  who  was 
burned  for  his  faith  in  the  antipodes,  his 
memory  lightens  the  heart  and  makes  us 
walk  undisturbed  among  graves.  And  so  the 
martyrs'  monument  is  a  wholesome  spot  in  the 
field  of  the  dead ;  and  as  we  look  upon  it,  a 
brave  influence  comes  to  us  from  the  land  of 
those  who  have  won  their  discharge,  and  in 
another  phrase  of  Patrick  Walker's,  got  'cleanly 
off  the  stage.' 

T  T  is  not  only  our  -  enemies,  those  desperate 
•*•  characters — it  is  we  ourselves  who  know 
not  what  we  do  ; — thence  springs  the  glimmer- 
ing hope  that  perhaps  we  do  better  than  we 
think :  that  to  scramble  through  this  random 
business  with  hands  reasonably  clean,  to  have 
played  the  part  of  a  man  or  woman  with  some 
191 


reasonable  fulness,  to  have  often  resisted  the 
diabolic,  and  at  the  end  to  be  still  resisting  it, 
is  for  the  poor  human  soldier  to  have  done 
right  well. 

\  1  7"E  are  not  content  to  pass  away  entirely 
*  *      from   the   scenes   of  our  delight ;   we 
would  leave,  if  but  in  gratitude,  a  pillar  and  a 
legend. 

'T^HERE  are  many  spiritual  eyes  that  seem 
•*•  to  spy  upon  our  actions — eyes  of  the 
dead  and  the  absent,  whom  we  imagine  to 
behold  us  in  our  most  private  hours,  and 
whom  we  fear  and  scruple  to  offend  :  our  wit- 
nesses and  judges. 

T  T  OW  unsubstantial  is  this  projection  of  a 
•*•  •••  man's  existence,  which  can  lie  in  abey- 
ance for  centuries  and  then  be  brushed  up 
again  and  set  forth  for  the  consideration  of 
posterity  by  a  few  dips  in  an  antiquary's  ink- 
pot I  This  precarious  tenure  of  fame  goes  a 
long  way  to  justify  those  (and  they  are  not  few) 
who  prefer  cakes  and  cream  in  the  immediate 
present. 

T)  UT  I  heard  the  voice  of  a  woman  singing 
*-*  some  sad,  old  endless  ballad  not  far  off. 
It  seemed  to  be  about  love  and  a  bel  amoureux, 
her  handsome  sweetheart ;  and  I  wished  I 
could  have  taken  up  the  strain  and  answered 
192 


her,  as  I  went  on  upon  my  invisible  woodland 
way,  weaving,  like  Pippa  in  the  poem,  my  own 
thoughts  with  hers.  What  could  I  have  told 
her  ?  Little  enough ;  and  yet  all  the  heart 
requires.  How  the  world  gives  and  takes 
away,  and  brings  sweethearts  near  only  to 
separate  them  again  into  distant  and  strange 
lands;  but  to  love  is  the  great  amulet  which 
makes  the  world  a  garden ;  and  '  hope,  which 
comes  to  all,'  outwears  the  accidents  of  life, 
and  reaches  with  tremulous  hand  beyond  the 
grave  and  death.  Easy  to  say :  yea,  but  also, 
by  God's  mercy,  both  easy  and  grateful  to 
believe  ! 

A  S  a  matter  of  fact,  although  few  things  are 
4*1  spoken  of  with  more  fearful  whisperings 
than  this  prospect  of  death,  few  have  less 
influence  on  conduct  under  healthy  circum- 
stances. ...  If  we  clung  as  devotedly  as  some 
philosophers  pretend  we  do  to  the  abstract 
idea  of  life,  or  were  half  as  frightened  as  they 
make  out  we  are,  for  the  subversive  accident 
that  ends  it  all,  the  trumpets  might  sound  by 
the  hour  and  no  one  would  follow  them  into 
battle — the  blue-peter  might  fly  at  the  truck, 
but  who  would  climb  into  a  sea-going  ship? 
Think  (if  these  philosophers  were  right)  with 
what  a  preparation  of  spirit  we  should  affront 
the  daily  peril  of  the  dinner-table:  a  deadlier 
spot  than  any  battle-field  in  history,  where  the 
far  greater  proportion  of  our  ancestors  have 
*  193 


miserably  left  their  bones !  What  woman 
would  ever  be  lured  into  marriage,  so  much 
more  dangerous  than  the  wildest  sea?  And 
what  would  it  be  to  grow  old  ? 

T  F  a  man  knows  he  will  sooner  or  later  be 
•*•  robbed  upon  a  journey,  he  will  have  a 
bottle  of  the  best  in  every  inn,  and  look  upon 
all  his  extravagances  as  so  much  gained  upon 
the  thieves.  And,  above  all,  where,  instead  of 
simply  spending,  he  makes  a  profitable  invest- 
ment for  some  of  his  money  when  it  will  be 
out  of  risk  of  loss.  So  every  bit  of  brisk  living, 
and,  above  all,  when  it  is  healthful,  is  just  so 
much  gained  upon  the  wholesale  filcher,  death. 
We  shall  have  the  less  in  our  pockets,  the  more 
in  our  stomachs,  when  he  cries,  '  Stand  and 
deliver.' 

T  T  is  better  to  lose  health  like  a  spendthrift 
*•  than  to  waste  it  like  a  miser.  It  is  better 
to  live  and  be  done  with  it,  than  to  die  daily 
in  the  sickroom.  By  all  means  begin  your 
folio ;  even  if  the  doctor  does  not  give  you  a, 
year,  even  if  he  hesitates  about  a  month,  make 
one  brave  push  and  see  what  can  be  accom- 
plished in  a  week.  It  is  not  only  in  finished 
undertakings  that  we  ought  to  honour  useful 
labour.  A  spirit  goes  out  of  the  man  who 
means  execution,  which  outlives  the  most 
untimely  ending.  All  who  have  meant  good 
work  with  their  whole  hearts,  have  done  good 
194 


work,  although  they  may  die  before  they  have 
the  time  to  sign  it.  Every  heart  that  has  beat 
strong  and  cheerfully  has  left  a  hopeful  impulse 
behind  it  in  the  world,  and  bettered  the  tradi- 
tion of  mankind. 


"VTOW  the  man  who  has  his  heart  on  his 
*^  sleeve,  and  a  good  whirling  weathercock 
of  a  brain,  who  reckons  his  life  as  a  thing  to 
be  dashingly  used  and  cheerfully  hazarded, 
makes  a  very  different  acquaintance  of  the 
world,  keeps  all  his  pulses  going  true  and 
fast,  and  gathers  impetus  as  he  runs,  until,  if 
he  be  running  towards  anything  better  than 
wildfire,  he  may  shoot  up  and  become  a 
constellation  in  the  end. 


the  time  comes  that  he  should  go, 
there  need  be  few  illusions  left  about 
himself.  Here  lies  one  who  meant  well,  tried 
a  little,  failed  much  :  —  surely  that  may  be  his 
epitaph,  of  which  he  need  not  be  ashamed,  nor 
will  he  complain  at  the  summons  which  calls 
a  defeated  soldier  from  the  field  ;  defeated,  ay, 
if  he  were  Paul  or  Marcus  Aurelius  !  —  but  if 
there  is  still  one  inch  of  fight  in  his  old  spirit, 
undishonoured.  The  faith  which  sustained 
him  in  his  lifelong  blindness  and  lifelong  dis- 
appointment will  scarce  even  be  required  in 
this  last  formality  of  laying  down  his  arms. 
Give  him  a  march  with  his  old  bones  ;  there, 
195 


out  of  the  glorious  sun-coloured  earth,  out  of 
the  day  and  the  dust  and  the  ecstasy — there 
goes  another  Faithful  Failure. 

\A7E  are  apt  to  make  so  much  of  the  tragedy 
* "  of  death,  and  think  so  little  of  the 
enduring  tragedy  of  some  men's  lives,  that  we 
see  more  to  lament  for  in  a  life  cut  off  in  the 
midst  of  usefulness  and  love,  than  in  one  that 
miserably  survives  all  love  and  usefulness,  and 
goes  about  the  world  the  phantom  of  itself, 
without  hope,  or  joy,  or  any  consolation. 

'  "Y^OU  are  a  strange  physician,'  said  Will, 
•*•      looking  steadfastly  upon  his  guest. 
'I  am  a  natural  law,'  he  replied,  'and  people 
call  me  Death.' 

'Why  did  you  not  tell  me  so  at  first?'  cried 
Will.  '  I  have  been  waiting  for  you  these 
many  years.  Give  me  your  hand,  and  wel- 
come.' 


T  T  NDER  the  wide  and  starry  sky 
^      Dig  the  grave  and  let  me  lie. 
Glad  did  I  live,  and  gladly  die, 
And  I  laid  me  down  with  a  will. 

This  be  the  verse  you  grave  for  me  : 
Here  he  lies  where  he  longed  to  be ; 
Home  is  the  sailor,  home  from  the  sea, 
And  the  hunter  home  from  the  hill. 


T)UT  the  girls  picked  up  their  skirts,  as  if 
-*-'  they  were  sure  they  had  good  ankles, 
and  followed  until  their  breath  was  out.  The 
last  to  weary  were  the  three  graces  and  a 
couple  of  companions ;  and  just  as  they,  too, 
had  had  enough,  the  foremost  of  the  three 
leaped  upon  a  tree-stump  and  kissed  her  hand 
to  the  canoeists.  Not  Diana  herself,  although 
this  was  more  of  a  Venus,  after  all,  could 
have  done  a  graceful  thing  more  gracefully. 
'Come  back  again!'  she  cried;  and  all  the 
others  echoed  her ;  and  the  hills  about  Origny 
repeated  the  words,  'Come  back.'  But  the 
river  had  us  round  an  angle  in  a  twinkling, 
and  we  were  alone  with  the  green  trees  and 
running  water. 

Come   back?     There  is   no  coming   back, 
young  ladies,  on  the  impetuous  stream  of  life. 

1  The  merchant  bows  unto  the  seaman's  star, 
The  plowman  from  the  sun  his  season  takes.' 

And  we  must  all  set  our  pocket  watches  by 
the  clock  of  fate.  There  is  a  headlong,  forth- 
right tide,  that  bears  away  man  with  his 
fancies  like  straw,  and  runs  fast  in  time  and 
space.  It  is  full  of  curves  like  this,  your 
winding  river  of  the  Oise  ;  and  lingers  and 
returns  in  pleasant  pastorals  ;  and  yet,  rightly 
thought  upon,  never  returns  at  all.  For 
though  it  should  revisit  the  same  acre  of 
meadow  in  the  same  hour,  it  will  have  made 
an  ample  sweep  between- whiles ;  many  little 
197 


streams  will  have  fallen  in ;  many  exhalations 
risen  toward  the  sun  ;  and  even  although  it 
were  the  same  acre,  it  will  not  be  the  same 
river  Oise.  And  thus,  oh  graces  of  Origny, 
although  the  wandering  fortune  of  my  life 
should  carry  me  back  again  to  where  you 
await  death's  whistle  by  the  river,  that  will 
not  be  the  old  I  who  walks  the  streets  ;  and 
those  wives  and  mothers,  say,  will  those  be 
you? 

THE    CELESTIAL   SURGEON 

T  F  I  have  faltered  more  or  less 
•••      In  my  great  task  of  happiness; 
If  I  have  moved  among  my  race 
And  shown  no  glorious  morning  face; 
If  beams  from  happy  human  eyes 
Have  moved  me  not ;  if  morning  skies, 
Books,  and  my  food,  and  summer  rain 
Knocked  on  my  sullen  heart  in  vain : — 
Lord,  Thy  most  pointed  pleasure  take 
And  stab  my  spirit  broad  awake; 
Or,  Lord,  if  too  obdurate  I, 
Choose  Thou,  before  that  spirit  die, 
A  piercing  pain,  a  killing  sin, 
And  to  my  dead  heart  run  them  in ! 

PURGE    out   of   every  heart   the  lurking 
grudge.     Give  us  grace  and  strength  to 
forbear  and  to  persevere.     Offenders,  give  us 
the  grace  to  accept  and  to  forgive  offenders. 
198 


Forgetful  ourselves,  help  us  to  bear  cheerfully 
the  forgetfulness  of  others.  Give  us  courage 
and  gaiety  and  the  quiet  mind.  Spare  us  to 
our  friends,  soften  us  to  our  enemies.  Bless 
us,  if  it  may  be,  in  all  our  innocent  endeavours. 
If  it  may  not,  give  us  the  strength  to  encounter 
that  which  is  to  come,  that  we  be  brave  in 
peril,  constant  in  tribulation,  temperate  in 
wrath,  and  in  all  changes  of  fortune,  and  down 
to  the  gates  of  death,  loyal  and  loving  one  to 
another. 

PRAYER   AT    MORNING 

'HPHE  day  returns  and  brings  us  the  petty 
•*•  round  of  irritating  concerns  and  duties. 
Help  us  to  play  the  man,  help  us  to  perform 
them  with  laughter  and  kind  faces,  let  cheer- 
fulness abound  with  industry.  Give  us  to  go 
blithely  on  our  business  all  this  day,  bring  us 
to  our  resting  beds  weary  and  content  and 
undishonoured,  and  grant  us  in  the  end  the 
gift  of  sleep. 

PRAYER   AT    EVENING 

/^UR  guard  is  relieved,  the  service  of  the 
^^  day  is  over,  and  the  hour  come  to  rest. 
We  resign  into  Thy  hands  our  sleeping  bodies, 
our  cold  hearths  and  open  doors.  Give  us  to 
awake  with  smiles,  give  us  to  labour  smiling. 
As  the  sun  returns  in  the  east,  so  let  our 
199 


patience  be  renewed  with  dawn;  as  the  sun 
lightens  the  world,  so  let  our  loving-kindness 
make  bright  this  house  of  our  habitations. 

"DLIND  us  to  the  offences  of  our  beloved, 
•*-*  cleanse  them  from  our  memories,  take 
them  out  of  our  mouths  for  ever.  Let  all  here 
before  Thee  carry  and  measure  with  the  false 
balances  of  love,  and  be  in  their  own  eyes  and 
in  all  conjunctures  the  most  guilty.  Help  us 
at  the  same  time  with  the  grace  of  courage, 
that  we  be  none  of  us  cast  down  when  we  sit 
lamenting  amid  the  ruins  of  our  happiness 
or  our  integrity  ;  touch  us  with  fire  from  the 
altar,  that  we  may  be  up  and  doing  to  rebuild 
our  city. 

"\  1  TE  beseech  Thee,  Lord,  to  behold  us  with 
*  •  favour,  folk  of  many  families  and 
nations  gathered  together  in  the  peace  of  this 
roof,  weak  men  and  women  subsisting  under 
the  covert  of  Thy  patience.  Be  patient  still ; 
suffer  us  yet  a  while  longer ; — with  our  broken 
purposes  of  good,  with  our  idle  endeavours 
against  evil,  suffer  us  a  while  longer  to  endure, 
and  (if  it  may  be)  help  us  to  do  better.  Bless 
to  us  our  extraordinary  mercies ;  if  the  day 
come  when  these  must  be  taken,  brace  us  to 
play  the  man  under  affliction.  Be  with  our 
friends,  be  with  ourselves.  Go  with  each  of 
us  to  rest ;  if  any  awake{  temper  to  them  the 
dark  hours  of  watching :  and  when  the  day 
200 


returns,  return  to  us,  our  sun  and  comforter, 
and  call  us  up  with  morning  faces  and  with 
morning  hearts — eager  to  labour — eager  to  be 
happy,  if  happiness  shall  be  our  portion — and 
if  the  day  be  marked  for  sorrow,  strong  to 
endure  it 


TABLE   OF  CONTENTS 


A  certain  sort  of  talent  Is  almost 
indispensable 

A  dogma  learned  is  only  a  new 
error, 

A  few  restrictions,  indeed,  re- 
main to  influence, 

After  all,  I  thought,  our  satirist,  . 

After  an  hospital,  what  uglier,     . 

Again,  when  you  have  married,  . 

Age  asks  with  timidity,         .       . 

A  generous  prayer,        .        .        . 

A  girl  at  school  In  France,   .        . 

A  happy  man  or  woman,       .        , 

A  human  truth,      .... 

A  knowledge  that  another  has  felt, 

Alas  and  alas  1  you  may  take  it 

how  you  will,       .... 

All  have  some  fault,      •       •       . 

All  literature,  from  Job,       .       . 
Ail  natural  talk  is  a  festival, 

All  opinions,  properly  so  called, . 

A  man  dissatisfied  with  endeavour, 
A  man  may  have  done  well  for 

years, 

A  man  may  live  in  dreams,  . 
A  man  who  has  a  few  friends, 
A  man  who  must  separate  himself. 
Among  sayings  that  have  a  cur- 


Vir?inibus  Puerisque,  170 
Books  -which  have  In- 
fluenced me,       .        .  180 

College  Papers,     .        .  197 

The  Satirist,          .        .  144 

Notes  on  Edinburgh,  .  146 

El  Dorado,    .        .       ,.  166 

The  Dynamiter,  .        .  38 

The  Merry  Men,  .        .  134 

An  Inland  Voyage,     .  3* 

An  Apology  for  Idlers,  96 
Books  luhich  have  In- 

Jtuencedmt,      .       .  134 

Roads 187 

An  Apology  for  Idlers,  51 
Familiar    Studies    of 

Men  and  Books,        .  193 
Aes  Triplex,         .       .  88 
Memories     and     Por- 
traits   140 

Crabbed      Agt       and 

Youth,       .        .        .in 

A  Christmas  Sermon,  153 
A   Utter  to  a   Young 

Gentleman,        ,       .  147 

The  Dynamiter,  .       ,  151 

yirginibut  Puerisyut,  183 

Thoreau,       .        •        .  73 

Truth  of  Intercourse,  ,  147 


203 


PACK 

An  Kim  In  life,       .      .       .       .      Tht    Amateur    Emi- 
grant,        .       .       .      80 

An  aspiration  Is  a  joy,  .        .       .      £Y  Dorado,    ...      57 

And  it  happens  that  literature,    .      Familiar    Studies    of 

Men  and  Books,        .     139 

And  It  may  be  worth  while,          .      Memories     and     Por- 
traits, .      45 

And  lastly,  he  was  dark,       .        .      Weir  of  Hermii ton,     .    164 

And  love,  considered  as  a  spec- 
tacle  On  Falling  in  Love,    .     159 

And  methought  that  beauty  and 
terror Songs  of  Travel,  .       .    xoa 

And  perhaps  if  you  could  read  In 
my  soul Travels  -with  a  Donkey,   106 

And  so  in  the  majority  of  cases, 
a  man Ordered  South,     .       .    189 

And  so  they  were  at  last  In  '  their 
resting  graves,1  ....      Notes  on  Edinburgh,  .    191 

And  then  I  had  an  Idea  for  John 
Silver My  First  Book,     .        .    176 

And  yet  even  while  I  was  exult- 
ing in  my  solitude,      .        .        .      Travels -with  a  Donkey,    160 

An  imperturbable  demeanour,     .      An  Inland  Voyage,     ,      99 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  although  few,      Aes  Trifle*,         .       .    193 

A  ship  captain  is  a  good  man  to 
marry, Virpinibus  Puerisque,     169 

As  I  went,  I  was  thinking,   .        .      Cocker-mouth  and  Kes- 

trie* 33 

As  soon  as  prudence  has  begun 
to  grow,  .        .        .  Aes  Triplex,         .        .    101 

As  the  business  man,    .        .        .      A  Character,        .       .      76 

As  we  dwell,  we  living  things,      .      Pul-vis  et  Umbra,         .      75 

As  we  go  catching  and  catching,       Crabbed      Age      and 

Youth,        :        .        .      52 

A  walking  tour  should  be  gone 
upon  alone, Walking  Tours,  .       .       9 

A  young  man  feels,       .       .       ,      Ordered  South.     .       .      40 


Benjamin  Franklin  went  through 

life, Lay  Morals,.       .       .    103 

1  Be  soople,  Davle,'       .       .        .      Kidnapped,   ...    151 
Between  these  two,  I  now  felt,          Dr.    Jekyll   and  Mr. 

Hyde,.        .  .      76 

Bltod  us  to  the  offences  of  our 

beloved,       .....      Prayers,        .        .        .    90O 
204 


Burns,  too  proud  and  honest  not 
to  work,  ..... 

But  every  one  sees  the  world,      . 

But  faces  have  a  trick,  .        .       . 

But  if  it  is  righteousness,      .       . 

But  I  heard  the  voice  of  a  woman 
singing  ...... 

But  indeed  it  is  not  so  much  for 
its  beauty  ...... 

But   it    is    an    eril   age  for  the 

gypsiiy  ...... 

But  it  is  odd  enough,  the  very 
women  ...... 

But  it  is  the  object  of  a  liberal 
education,  ..... 

But  let  the  man  learn  to  love  a 
woman,  ..... 

But  our  ancestral  adventures, 

But  O,  what  a  cruel  thing,      . 

But,  struggle  as  you  please, 

But  surely  it  is  no  very  extrava- 

gant opinion  ..... 
But   the   girls   picked   up   their 

skirts  ....... 

But    the    gymnast    is    not    my 

favourite  ...... 

But  the  race  of  man,     .        .       . 
But  there  are  duties  which  come 

before  gratitude,        .        .       . 
But  to  be  a  true  disciple,     .        . 
But  we  are  all  travellers,      . 
But  we  have  no  bravery.      .        . 

Certainly,  whatever  It  may  be,    . 

Cheylard  scrapes  together  half- 
pence ....... 

Childhood  must  pass  away,  . 
Children,  for  Instance,  are  able,  . 
Conclusions,  indeed,  are  not  often, 

Condescension    Is    an    excellent 
thing  ....... 

Culture  is  not  measured, 


PAGB 
Familiar    Studies    »f 

Mtn  and  Books,        .  30 

Ordered  South,      .        .  a 

An  Autumn  Effect.     .  53 

Lay  Morals, ...  133 

Travels  inith  a  Donkey,  193 

Forest  Notes,         ,       .  17 

An  Inland  Voyage,     .  150 

An  Inland  Voyage,     ,  151 

Virginibus  Puerisque,  168 

Lay  Morals,.         .         .  81 
Memories     and     Per* 

traits,          ...  34 

Travels  -with  a  Donkey,  1 50 

The  Wrecker,       .       .  59 

Familiar  Studies,        .  183 

An  Inland  Voyage,     .  197 

An  Inland  Voyage,      .  173 

Tra-vtls  -with  a  Donkey,  86 

Father  Damien,  .        .  183 

Lay  Morals,  .         ,        .  126 

Travels  -with  a  Donkey,  181 

Walking  Tours,  .        .  151 

Familiar    Studies    of 

Men  and  Books,        .  158 

Travels  -with  a  Donkey,  114 
Crabbed  Youth,    .        .  37 
Child's  Play,         .        .  48 
Memories    and    Por- 
traits,         ...  136 

Weir  of  Hermiston,     .  151 
The    Amateur    Emi- 
grant,       .          .  109 


205 


Delay,  they  say,  begetteth  peril, 
Discredited  as  they  are  in  prac- 

N 
The  Slack  Arrow,       . 
Crabbed    Aft    and 

iGR 
150 

44 

•  Do  I,  Indeed,  lack  courage  »  '    . 

The  Great  North  Road, 

81 

Drama  is  the  poetry  of  conduct. 

A  Gossip  »n  Romance, 

'S3 

Each  man  should  learn,       .       . 

Tht   Morality   o/   the 

Profession  o/  Letters, 

134 

Even  If  death  catch  people,  like  an, 

Aes  Triplex, 

190 

Even   women,   who    understand 

Some  Portraits  of  Rae- 

men,     • 

burn  

180 

Every  man  has  a  sane  spot, 

Tht  Wrecker, 

150 

Every  one  who  has  been  upon  a 

Familiar    Studies    of 

walking        ,        ,        .        •        • 

Men  and  Bocks, 

7 

Every  one  lives  by  selling  some- 
thing                                   , 

Extreme  busyness,        .       .       . 

An  Apology  for  Idlers, 

I52 

33 

Farewell,  fair  day,         ... 

Sonfs  of  Travel,  .       . 

63 

For,  after  all,  we  are  vessels  of,  . 

Books  -which  have  In- 

fluenced me,       , 

»# 

For  as  the  race  of  man,        .       . 

Virginibus  Puerisque, 

36 

For  charity  begins, 

Travels  -with  a  Donkey, 

106 

For  courage  respects  courage,    . 

Travels  -with  a  Donkey, 

"S 

For  even  in  love  

Truth  of  Intercourse,  . 

'54 

Forgive  me,  if  I  seem  to  teach,    . 

Olalla  

107 

For  my  part,  I  can  see  few  things, 

Truth  of  Intercourse,  . 

54 

For  my  part,  I  travel,  ... 

Travels  with  a  Donkey, 

8 

For  still  the  Lord  

Underwoods, 

116 

For  such  things  as  honour,  . 

Francis  Yillon,    . 

148 

For  surely,  at  this  time  of  th«  day, 

Morality   of  the   Pro- 

fession of  Letters,      , 

143 

For  the  country  people,       .       . 

Notes  on  Edinburgh,  . 

a? 

For     there     is     something     in 

I 

1  66 

Forth  from  the  casement,    .        . 

Underwoods, 

70 

For    to    do    anything    because 

Familiar    Studies    of 

others  

Men  and  Books,        . 

131 

For,  to  repeat,  the  ground,  .        , 

The  Lantern  Bearers, 

91 

For  truth  that  is  suppressed,        . 

Father  Damien,  , 

ISO 

For  when  we  are  put  down,         . 

Unpleasant  Places,      , 

18 

Gentleness  and  cheerfulness,       ,  A  Christmas  Sermon, 

Give  to  me  the  life  I  love,  . .        .  Songs  of  Travel,  ,       . 

Cod,  If  there  be  any  God.  speaks,  Lay  Morals, .       .       . 
206 


Had  ho  but  talked,       .       . 

Happiness  and  goodness,    .       . 
Happiness,  at  least,  Is  not  solitary, 

Herein.  I  think,  lies  the  chief 
attraction 

He  surprised  himself, 

He  talked  for  the  pleasure  of 
airing  himself 

He  who  has  learned  to  love  an 
art,  .  .... 

He  who  shall  pass  judgment, 

His  was,  indeed,  a  good  influence, 

Honour  can  survive  a  wound,      . 

Hope  looks  for  unqualified  suc- 
cess  

Hope,  they  say,  deserts  us. 

How  unsubstantial  is  this  pro- 
jection,   

How  wholly  we  all  lie  at  the 
mercy,  ..... 


PACK 

Weir  ofHermiston,    ,  40 

A  Christmas  Sermon,  iax 
Familiar    Studies    qf 

Men  and  Boeks,        .  98 

Ordered  South,      .        .  xj 

Weir  ofHermiston,     .  4 

Weir  ofHermiston,     .  135 

Lay  Morals. ...  75 
Master  of  Ballantrae,  99 
An  Inland  Voyage,      .  96 
Memories    and    Por- 
traits   xoo 

Virginibus  Puerisgue,  167 

Virginibus  Puerisque,  81 
Familiar    Studies    of 

Men  and  Books,        ,  192 

Weir  tfHermiston,     .  136 


I  am  sorry  Indeed  that  I  hare,    . 

I  began  my  little  pilgrimage, 

I  begin    to    perceive   that  it  is 

necessary,   

I   believe  in  a  better   state   of 

things 

I  can  excuse  a  person,  .       .       . 


Memories    and   Por- 
traits,        ...    114 

An  Autumn  Effect,     .      11 


The  Dynamiter, 


114 


I  could  hare  thought  he  had  been, 
I  could  not  finish  The  Pirate,  . 
If  a  man  knows  he  will  sooner  or 

later 

If  a  man  lives,         .... 

If  a  person  cannot  be  happy, 

•Iffolkdinnaken.' 

If  I  have  faltered  more  or  less,    . 

I  find  I  never  weary  of  great 

churches 

If  people  knew  what  an  Inspiriting, 
I'  you  teach  a  man  to  keep,          . 
I  hate  cynicism  a  great  deal  worse, 
207 


Wurses 103 

Cockermotith  and  Kes- 

ivick xoo 

A  Retrospect,        .        .  186 

Random  Memories,     .  45 

An  Inland  Voyage,     .  to/ 
Crabbed  Age  and  Youth,   37 

An  Apology  for  Idlers,  34 

David  Balfour    .        .  106 

Songs  of  Travel,         .  198 


An  Inland  Voyage, 
An  Inland  Voyage, 

An  Inland  Vtyagt, 


75 


PAGH 

I  hare  been  made  to  learn,  .       . 

Dr.    fikytt  and   Mr. 

Hyde  

69 

I  have  ueen  wicked  men,      .        . 

Kidnapped,  . 

loa 

I  know  a  village  where  there  are, 

Walking  Tours,  . 

»4 

'I  lead  you,'  he  would  say,  .        . 

The  Treasure  of  Fran- 

chard, 

67 

In  all  garrison  towns,    .       .       . 

An  Inland  Voyage,      . 

105 

In  anything  fit  to  be  called,         . 

Memories    and    Por- 

traits, 

176 

Indeed,  I  believe  this  is  the  lesson, 

The  English  Admirals, 

74 

Indeed,  I  can  see  no  dishonesty, 

Travels  ivith  a  Donkey. 

118 

Industry  Is,  In  itself,      . 

Familiar    Studies     of 

Men  and  Books, 

60 

In  his  own  life,  then,  a  man,        . 

A  Christmas  Sermon, 

95 

In  one  word,  it  must  always, 

Morality   of  the   Pro- 

fession of  Letters,      . 

I3« 

In  particular,  I  heard  of  clergy- 

men   

Carrie*  and  Galloway, 

127 

In  the  best  fabric  of  duplicity,     . 

The  Master  of  Ballan- 

trae  

145 

In  these  near  intimacies,      . 

Familiar    Studiet    of 

Men  and  Books, 

183 

In  this  world  of  imperfections,    . 

Travelstuith  a  Donkey. 

181 

Into  how  many  houses,          .        . 

Travels  -with  a  Donkey, 

59 

I  own  I  like  definite  form,    . 

Tratiels  with  a  Donkey, 

IS 

I  rose  and  lifted  a  corner,    . 

Units  Blanches,    . 

46 

I  shall  be  reminded,      . 

Puliris  et  Umbra, 

93 

I  suppose  none  of  us  recognise,  . 

An  Inland  Voyage,      . 

26 

It  always  warms  a  man,         .        . 

Da-vid  Balfour     . 

'Si 

It  had  been  long  his  practice,      . 

Prince  Otto.  . 

4i 

It  had  snowed  overnight, 

Ca  rruk  and  Galloway. 

3° 

I  think  it  worth  noting  how  this, 

Memoirs   of  Flecming 

Jenkin,       .        .        . 

85 

It  Is  a  commonplace  that  we, 

An  Inland  Voyage,     . 

86 

It  is  a  great  thing  if   you   can 

An  Inland  Voyage, 

It  is  all  very  fine  to  talk  about 

I$O 

tramps  

An  Inland  Voyage,     . 

1  49 

It  is  almost  as  if  the  millennium,  . 

Walking  Tours, 

14 

It  is  an  odd  thing  how  happily,    . 

An  Inland  Voyage,     . 

164 

It  is  a  poor  heart,  .... 

Familiar   Studies    of 

Men  and  Books, 

87 

It  Is  at  best  but  a  pettifogging,   . 

The  English  Admirals, 

US 

%  is  a  useful  accomplishment,      . 

Familiar    Studies    of 

Men  and  Books, 

101 

208 


It  is  better  to  lose  health  like  a 
spendthrift,          ...» 
It  is  but  a  lying  cant,     .        . 
It 's  deadly  commonplace,    .       . 
It  is  easy  to  be  virtuous,       .       • 

It  Is  good  to  hare  been  young,    . 

It  is  in  virtue  of  his  own  desires, 
It  is  never  a  thankful  office, 

It  is  not  a  basketful  of  law-papers, 
It  is  not  always  the  most  faithful, 
It  is  not  at  all  a  strong  thing, 
It  is  not  enough  to  have  earned, 

It 's  not  only  a  great  flight  of  con- 
fidence  

It  is  not  only  our  enemies,     . 

It  is  not  over  the  virtues. 

It  is  not  possible  to  keep  the 
mind 

It  is  one  of  the  most  common 
forms, 

It  is  perhaps  a.  more  fortunate 
destiny 

It  Is  said  that  a  poet,     .        .       . 

It  is  supposed  that  all  knowledge, 

It  is  surely  beyond  a  doubt, 

It  Is  to  some  more  specific  memory, 

It  is  the  mark  of  a  modest  man    . 

It    Is    the    property    of    things 

seen 

It  may  be  argued  again, 

It  must  not  be  imagined, 

I  told  him  I  was  not  much  afraid, 

It  remains  to  be  seen,  by  each 


It  remains  to  be  seen, 


It  was  my  custom. 

It  was  one  of  the  best  things, 


PAGE 

Aet  Triplex,  .  .  194 

An  Inland  Voyage.  .  63 

WeirofHermiston,  .  tffi 
An  Appeal  to  the 

Clergy,  .  xoc 
Introduction  to  Vir- 

ginibus  Puerisque,  .  53 

El  Dorado,  ...  19 
An  Appeal  to  the 

Clergy,  ...  99 

Travels -with  a  Donkey,  115 

Travels -with  a  Donkey,  150 

An  Inland  Voyage,  135 
Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,        .  146 

Travels-witha  Donkey,  115 
A  Christinas  Sermon,  191 
TheEnglish  Admirals,  90 

Crabbed  A  ft,  .  .  38 
Notes  on  Edinburgh,  .  152 

Lay  Morals,  .  .  79 

The  Lantern  Bearers,  90 

A  n  Apology  for  Idlers,  1 1 2 

A  n  Apology  for  Idlers,  1 1 1 
Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,  .  x 
Dr.  Jekyll  and  Mr. 

Hyde 183 

Will  o"  the  Mill,   ,        .  157 

A  Christmas  Sermon,  78 

Walking  Tours,  .        .  10 

Travels  with  a  Donkey,  87 

Lay  Morals,  .  .  142 
An  Appeal  t»  the 

Clergy,  .  .  .  foe 

Units  Blanches,  .  .  64 
The  Education  of  an 

EnginetTg  .        .        .  a 


209 


It  would  be  well  If  nations,  . 

I  was  walking  one  night,       .  . 

I  wonder,  would  a  negative,  . 

Jealousy,  at  any  rate,    .       .  . 

Kirstie  was  now  over  fifty,    .  . 

L'Art  de  bien  dire, 

Let  any  man  speak  long  enough, 

Life,  as  a  matter  of  fact,        .  . 

Life  goes  before  us,       .        .  . 

Life  Is  hard  enough,      .       .  . 

Life,  though  largely,  is  not. 

Look  back  now,  for  a  moment,  . 
Love  is  not  blind,  .... 


Mankind  is  not  only  the  whole,  . 
Many  a  man  would  have  even,  . 

Many  a  man's  destiny,  .       .       , 

Marriage  is  a  step  so  grave,  . 
Marriage  is  of  so  much  use,  , 
Men,  whether  lay  or  clerical. 

Mirth,  lyric  mirth, 

Mme.    Bazin    came    out    after 

awhile 

Morals  are  a  personal  affair, 
Most  men,  hading  themselves,     . 

•  Mr.  Archer  was  telling  me  in,'  . 

•  My  friend,'  said  I, '  it  is  not  easy,' 
My  idea  of  man's  chief  end, 
•My  poor,  dear  boy  1'   . 

Natural  talk,  like  ploughing,        . 

Nature  is  a  good  guide  through 

Ufa 

2TO 


PAGE 

Ft/ntainebleau,  ,  .  104 
The  Genesis  of  the 

Master  of  Ballantrae,  90 
An  Inland  Voyage,  .  153 

On  Falling  in  Love,  .  159 
Wtir  »f  Hermiston,  .  163 

Truth  of  Intercourse,  .  179 
7 he  Master  of  Ballan- 

trae 153 

Familiar   Studies    of 

Men  and  Books,         .       J4 
Memories    and    Por- 
traits,         ...      58 
Familiar    Studies    of 

Men  and  Book*,        .     175 

Truth  of  Intercourse,       184 

Lay  Morals,        ".        .108 

Familiar    Studies   of 

Men  and  Books,        .     151 

Lay  Morals,  .  .  131 
Dr.  JekyU  and  Mr. 

Hyde,  ...  77 
Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,  .  105 
Virginibus  Puerisque,  165 
Virgimbus  Puerisque,  171 
An  Appeal  to  the 

Clergy,  .  .  .99 
Fontainebleau,  .  .  174 

An  Inland  Voyage,  .  97 
Lay  Morals,  .  .  132 
Memories  and  Por- 
traits, .  „  .  .  149 
The  Great  North  Road,  80 
Travels  -with  a  Donkey,  114 
The  Wrecker,  .  .172 
Weir  of  Hermiston,  .  51 

Memories  and  Por- 
traits, .  .  .  136 

The  Amateur  £mi- 
frant,  ...  124 


ft 

1GB 

Nay.  and  the  Idler,        ,       .       . 

An  Apolofy  for  fillers. 

"3 

Never  ask  women  folk, 

Uawd  Sal/our     ,        • 

164 

Nevertheless,  there  is  a  certain 

frame,  

Immortelles,          .        . 

100 

No  art,  it  may  be  said,  .        .       . 

Fontainebleau,     ,        . 

98 

Noble  disappointment,          .       . 

A  Christmas  Sermon, 

133 

No  class  of  man  is  altogether  bad, 

Kidnapped,  .        .        . 

»5» 

No  man  can  find  out  the  world,    . 

Ordered  South,     .        , 

5 

No  man  was  ever  so  poor,    .       . 

Lay  Morals, 

*4* 

None  more  than  children,    .       . 

Memories     and    Por- 

traits, 

47 

No  one  knows  the  stars,       .       . 

Travels  with  a  Donkey, 

4 

Nor  does  the  scenery  any  more 
effect 

Unpleasant  Places, 

Nothing  is  given  for  nothing, 

Familiar     Studies    ef 

Men  and  Books, 

157 

Now  the  man  who  has  his  heart, 

Aes  Triplex,         .        . 
Walkinp  Tours 

i9S 

Now  this  is  where  there  should  be, 

Virginibus  Puerisque, 

'3 
171 

Now,  what   I  like  so   much   In 

France,        •       •       •      •       • 

An  Inland  Voyage,     > 

3» 

Of  this  one  thing  I  am  sure,         . 

An  Inland  Vtyage,     . 

95 

Of    those    who    are    to  act  m- 

Familiar    Studies    of 

fluentially,          .       .       •       • 

Men  and  Books, 

i85 

Of  those  who  fan,           .       ,       . 

The    day     after     To- 

morrow,    . 

93 

O,  have  It  your  own  way,     .       . 

St.lves,         .       .       . 

"59 

'Olalla,'    I    said,   'the  soul  and 

the  body,'    

Olalla,   . 

TtfJ 

On  all  this  part  of  the  coast, 

The  Merry  Men,  .        , 

*54 

30 

Or  take  the  case  of  men  of  letters, 

Lay  Morals, 

MS 

O  to  be  up  and  doing,  .        .        . 

Songs  of  Travel,  .       . 

70 

Our  guard  Is  relieved,   . 

Prayers,        ,        .        . 

199 

Overmastering  pain—  the  most,    . 

Chiifs  Play.        .       . 

141 

People  may  lay  down  their  lives, 

Crabbed      Age     and 

Youth, 

37 

People  usually    do    things,  and 

suffer  

The  English  Admirals, 

'74 

Perpetual  devotion  to  what  a  man, 

An  Apology  for  Idlers, 

6a 

Pitiful  Is  the  case  of  the  blind,     . 

Truth  of  Jntercourse,  . 

54 

Pity  was  her  weapon,    .       .        . 

The  Great  North  Road, 

165 

Place  them  In  a  hospital,      . 

St.IV€S,            .          .          . 

153 

211 

PV 

i.GH 

Pleasures  Are  more  beneficial,     . 

AH  Apology  fjr  Idlers, 

96 

Poor  soul,  here  for  so  little. 

Pulvis  ct  Umbra, 

94 

Practice  Is  a  more  intricate,         . 

Lay  Morals, 

124 

Purge  out  of  every  heart,     .        . 

Prayers, 

198 

Respectability    Is   a   very   good 
thine 

Sdence  writes  of  the  world, 

Pan's  Pipes,  . 

*44 

90 

She  sent  me  away,  and  yet,         . 

Olalla  

154 

She  was  as  dead  an  old  woman,  . 

An  Inland  Voyage,     . 

65 

So,  as  we  grow  old, 

Crabbed      Age      and 

Youth, 

43 

So  in  youth,  like  Moses,       . 

Fontainebleau,     , 

47 

So  kindly  is  the  world  arranged, 

The    Morality   of  the 

Profession  of  Letters, 

105 

Somehow  my  playmate, 

Randon  Memories, 

46 

Some  strand  of  our  own  misdoing, 

Prince  Otto,  . 

IS' 

So  strangely  are  we  built,     . 

5/.  Ives, 

1  60 

So  that  the  first  duty  of  any  man, 

The    Morality    of  the 

Profession  of  Letters, 

»7S 

So  you  sit,  like  Jupiter, 

Notes  on  Edinburgh,  . 

38 

Study  and  experiment, 

The     Day    after    To. 

morrow. 

58 

Style  Is  the  invariable  mark,         . 

A  Note  on  Realism,     . 

177 

Sympathy  is  a  thing  to  be,  .       . 

Some     Portraits     of 

Raeburn,   .       ,       . 

MS 

That  Is  never  a  bad  wind,     . 

St.  Ives, 

150 

The  accepted  novelist,         .        . 

My  First  Book,     . 

68 

The  average  man  lives,         ,        , 

Books  which  have  In- 

fluenced me. 

119 

The  bed  was  made,       .        .        . 

Travels  -with  a  Donkey, 

15 

The  best  teachers  are  the  aged, 

Memories    and    Por- 

traits, 

83 

The  canting  moralist,    . 

Pulvis  et  Umbra, 

190 

The  child,  the  seed,  the  grain  of 

corn,     

Underwoods. 

136 

The  child  thinks  much, 

Random  Memories,     , 

46 

The  correction  of  silence,     ,       . 

Memories     and     Por- 

traits, 

140 

•  The  cost  of  a  thing,'    .       . 

Familiar    Studies    of 

Men  and  Books, 

03 

The  cruellest  lies  are  often  told,  . 

Truth  of  Intercourse, 

»3S 

212 


The  day  returns 

The  drawing-room  Is,  indeed,     . 

The  effervescency  of  her  passion- 
ate  

The  embers  of  the  day  are  red,  . 
The  fact  is,  fame  may  be,     . 
The  fact  Is,  we  are  much,     .        . 
The  fame  of  other  lands, 
The  flower  of  the  hedgerow,        . 
The  follies  of  youth,      .        . 

The  fortune  of  a  tale,    .       .       . 

The  future  Is  nothing,   .        .        . 
The  gauger  walked  with  willing 

foot 

The  Greeks  figured  Pan,      . 
The  ground  of  all  youth  s,    . 

The  habitual  liar  may  be,     . 
The  human  race  is  a  thing,  . 
The  incommunicable  thrill,  .        . 
The  Interests  of  youth,         .        . 

The  lads  go  forth, 

The  life  of  the  apprentice, 
The  longest  and  most  abstruse,  . 
The  love  of  words,        .        .        . 
The  man  who  cannot  forgive, 
The    morning  drum-call   on  my 

eager  ear 

The  most  influential  books,  .        . 

The  night,  though  we  were, 
The  obvious  is  not  of  necessity,  . 

The  pleasure  that  we  take,  .        . 
The  problem  of  education,  . 
The  regret  we  have,      . 
The  remainder  of  my  childish,    . 
The  salary  In  any  business,  .        , 


The  schoolboy  has  a  keen,  . 


PAGH 

Prayers,        ...  199 
Memories     and     Por- 
traits,                        .  ifin 

Wiir  of Hermiston,     .  164 

Songs  of  Travel,  .        .  125 

The  English  A  dmirals,  63 

Virginibus  Puerisque,  172 

Will  a'  the  Mill,  .        .  56 

St.  Ives,                         .  160 
Crabbed      Age      and 

Youth,        ...  39 
Memories     and    Por- 
traits,        ...  178 
A  Retrospect,         .        .  36 

Songs  of  Travel,           ,  8 

Pan's  Pipes,          .        ,  ai 
Memories     and    Por- 

traits,  .  .  .187 
Truth  of Intercourse,  182 
Pulvis  et  Umbra,  .  119 
Fontainebleau,  .  .  174 
Memories  and  Por- 
traits, .  .  .  i83 
A  Mountain  Town  in 

France,      ...  55 

Fontainebleau,     .        .  178 

Lay  Morals,          .         .  102 

Fontainebleau,      .        .  178 

Prince  Otto,  .        ,        ,  101 

Songs  of  Travel,  .  .  187 
Books  which  have  In- 
fluenced me,  .  .  123 
The  Merry  Men,  .  .  28 
Memories  and  Por- 
traits, .  .  .177 
Ordered  South,  .  .  3 
Lay  Morals,  ,  .  108 
Child's  Play,  .  ,  36 
Random  Memories,  .  46 
The  Morality  of  the 

Profession  of  Letters,  72 

Yxhida  Torajiro,       .  44 


213 


The  sex  likes  to  pick  up,      .  . 

The  shadow  of  a  great  oak,  .  . 

The  soul  asks  honour,  .  .  . 
The  spice  of  life  U  battle,  . 

The  true  parallel  for  play.    . 
The  ways  of  men  seem  always,    . 
The  whole  creation  groaneth. 
The  whole  day  was  showery, 
The   word    'facts'    Is,    hi   some 

ways 

There    are     many     matters    in 

which, 

There  are  many  spiritual  eyes,    . 

There  are  no  persons  so  far,        . 

'  There  are  some  pains,'  said  he, 
There  are  two  just  reasons, . 

There  are  two  thing's  that  men,  . 
There  can  be  no  fairer  ambition, 

There  is  a  certain  class,  ,  . 
There  is  a  certain  critic,  .  . 

There  is  a  kind  of  gaping,  .  . 
There  is  an  idea  abroad,  ,  . 
There  is  a  strong  feeling,  .  . 

There  Is  more  adventure,     . 

There  Is  nobody  under  thirty,  . 
There  is  no  doubt  that  the,  .  . 
There  is  no  end,  indeed,  to,  . 
There  is  no  friendship  so  noble,  . 

There  is  no  greater  wonder,  . 
There  is  no  quite  good  book,  . 

There  Is  not  anything  more  bitter, 
There  is  nothing  but  tit  for  tat,  . 
There  is  only  one  event  In  life,  . 
Then  Is  only  one  wish,  .  . 
214 


PACK 

An  Inland  Voyage,  .  161 
Lay  Morals,  .  .  s«7 
Lay  Morals,  .  .  124 
Memories  and  Por- 
traits, ...  S3 
Child's  Play,  .  .  48 
Unpleasant  Places,  .  loo 
Pultris  et  Umbra,  .  138 
An  Inland  Voyage.  .  16 

Virginibus  Puerisyue,  118 

On  Falling  in  Love,    .  155 
Memories     and     Por- 
trait t.           .        .        .  loa 
The  Matter  o/Ballan- 

trot 172 

The  Great  North  Road,  183 
Morality   of  the   Pro- 
fession of  Letters,     .  94 
Kidnapped,            .         .  146 
Memories     and     For- 

traits,          .        .        .137 
Familiar    Studies    «/ 

Men  and  Books,         ,  iaa 
Memories     and     For- 

traits,          ...  33 

Notes  on  Fdinburph,   ,  177 

A  Christmas  Sermon,  95 
Crabbed       Age       and 

Youth,  ...  148 
An  Amateur  Emi- 
grant, ...  57 
An  Inland  Voyage,  .  it 
An  Inland  Voyage,  .  106 
El  Dorado,  ...  19 
Familiar  Studies  o/ 

Men  and  Boots,  .  i8a 
Da-vid  Balfour  ,  .  155 
Memories  and  Par- 
traits,  .  .  .  T70 
David  BalfOur  .  .  ma 
An  Inland  Voyage,  ,  87 
On  Falling  in  Lev*,  .  igC 
El  Dorado,  ...  73 


There  is  something:  Irreverent,    . 

There  is  yet  another  class,  .  . 
There  never  was  a  child,  .  . 

There  should  be  some  myth,  . 
There  was  never  an  ill  thing,  . 
These  are  predestined, 

This  Is  an  ago,       .... 

This  is  the  particular  crown  and 
triumph 

Those  who  go  the  devil  in 
youth 

Those  who  have  a  few  intimates, 

Those  who  play  by  rule,       .        . 

Those  who  try  to  be  artists,         , 

Though  I  have  all  my  life  been,  . 

Through  no  art  beside  the  art,    . 
Through  what  little  channels, 
Time    went    on,   and    the    boy's 

health 

Tis  a  one  thing  to  smart,  .  . 
To  any  man  there  may  come,  . 
To  ask  to  see  some  fruit,  .  . 
To  avoid  an  occasion,  .  .  . 
To  be  a  gentleman,  .  .  . 

To  be  honest,  to  be  kind,     . 
To  be  what  we  are,       .       .        . 

To  be  wholly  devoted,  ... 
To  cling  to  what  is  left,  .  . 

To  deal  plainly,  if  they  only,  . 
To  know  what  you  like,  .  . 

To  leave  home  in  early  life, .        . 

To  look  on  the  happy   side  of 
nature,          ..... 
To  make  our  idea  of  morality,     . 
215 


PACE 
Crabbed      Age       and 

Youth,        ...  37 

Nates  on  Edinburgh,   .  98 
Memories     and     Par- 

traits,          ...  47 

An  Inland  Voyage,     .  is 

The  Merry  Men,           .  152 
A   Letter  to  a   Young 

Gentleman,         .        .  174 
Memoirs  of  Fleeming 

Jenkin,      ...  34 
Memories    and    Por- 
traits,        .        .        .  175 
Crabbed       Age      and 

Youth,  ...  39 
Virginibus  Puerisyue,  169 
Lay  Morals, .  .  .  130 
Memories  and  Por- 
traits, .  .  .  153 
The  Master  of  BaUan- 

trae 143 

Pilgrim's  Progress,     .  175 

Random  Memories,     .  45 
The        Treasure        of 

Franchard,  .  .  66 
The  Great  North  Road,  7* 
The  Ebb  Tide,  .  .  136 
A  Christmas  Sermon,  133 
Virginibus  Puerisque,  74 
The  Amateur  Emi- 
grant, ...  144 
A  Christmas  Sermon,  75 
Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,  .  81 
Weir  of  Hermiston,  .  57 
Memories  and  Por- 
traits, .  .  .  151 
Virginibus  Puerisyue,  155 
A  Letter  to  a  Young 

Gentle-man,        ,        .  43 
Memories    and    Por- 
traits,        .       .       .  n 

Pan's  Pipes,,       .       .  ac 

A  Christmas  Sermon,  laa 


To  pass  from  hearing;  literature, 
To  please  is  to  serve,  .  .  . 

To  reckon  dangers  too  curiously, 
To  speak  truth  there  must  be.  . 
To  the  best  of  my  belief, 

To  wash  in  one  of  God's  rivers,  . 
To  write  with  authority,  .  . 

Truth  of  intercourse  is  something, 
Under  the  wide  and  starry  sky,  . 
Vanity  dies  hard,  .... 

We  all  suffer  ourselres  to  be  too 

much 

We  are  accustomed  nowadays,    . 

We  are  all  employed  in  commerce 
during  the  day,  .... 

We  are  all  incompris,  only  more, 

We  are  all  so  busy,        .        . 

We  are  all  such  as  He  was,  . 

We  are  apt  to  make  so  much, 

We  are  different  with  different 
friends 

We  are  not  all  patient  Grizzels,  . 

We  are  not  content  to  pass, 

We  beseech  Thee,  Lord,     . 

We  can  all  be  angry,     ... 

We  had  needs  Invent  heaven,  . 
•  Well,  an  ye  like  maids  so  little,' 
We  make  love,  and  thereby,  . 
We  may  escape  uncongenial  toil, 

Weir  must  have  supposed  his 
bride, 

We  shall  never  learn  the  affinities, 

Wo   travelled    In    the    print    of 

olden  wen,  ..... 

216 


PAGH 

Random  Memories,  .  105 
The  Morality  of  the 

Profession  o/ Letters,  174 
Pan's  Pipes,  ,  aa 
Truth  of  Intercourse,  ,  43 
Philosophy  of  Nomen- 
clature, .  .  .  104 
Travels  vith  a  Donkey,  15 
Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,         .  104 

Truth  o/  Intercourse,  .  134 

A  Requiem,  ,       ,       .  196 

Prince  Otto,  ...  150 

The  Morality  of  the 

Profession  of  Letters,  73 

Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,  .  109 

An  Inland  Voyage,      ,  25 

Truth  of  Intercourse,  .  181 

Walking  Tours, .        .  92 

Olalla 133 

An  Autumn  Effect,  .  196 
Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,  ,  184 
Nurses,  ...  99 
Fontainebleau,  .  .  193 
Prayers,  .  .  .  200 
Books  -which  have  In- 
fluenced me,  .  .  101 

St.  I-ues 103 

The  Black  Arrow,  .  172 
St.  Ives,  .  .  .159 
Familiar  Studies  of 

Men  and  Books,      .  6x 

Weir  ofHermiston,     .  164 
On     Some     Technical 
Elements  of  Style -to 

Literature,        .        .  174 

Underwoods,                 .  22 


Whatever  we  are  to  expect,         . 
•  What  is  mine,  then,'    . 
•What  is  this  fortunate  circum- 
stance  !  '        
What  shall  we  be  when  we,  . 
What  sound  Is  so  full  of  music,     . 
When  I  was  going,  up  got,  . 
When  the  generation  is  gone, 
When  the  old  man  waggles  his 
head,    

ft 
Chilfs  Play, 
Olalla  
The        Treasure       of 
Franc  hard,       .        . 
Collect  Papers,      . 
St.Ives, 
An  Inland  Voyage,     , 
On  Falling  in  Love,    . 
Crabbed       Age      and 
Youth, 

iGH 
49 
35 

69 

44 
IS8 
66 
167 

When  the   time  comes  that  he 
should  go,    ...                . 

When  you  have  read,    .       .       . 
When  we  are  looking  at  a  land- 

Books  which  have  In- 
fluenced me,      .        . 

I 

When  we  grow  elderly,         .        . 
Where  did  you  hear  that  it  was 

St.  /vet,        .       .       . 
Lay  Morals 

4» 

Whether  people's  gratitude, 
Whether  we  regard  life  as  a  lane, 
With  all  this  in  mind,    .        .        . 
With  our  chosen  friends, 

An  Inland  Voyage,     . 
Aes  Triplex, 
Unpleasant  Places,      . 
Truth  oj  Intercourse,  . 

102 
89 

18 
159 

Yet  it  is  to  this  very  responsibility, 
You    are   a    friend    of    Archie 

Weir'sr 

1  You  are  a  strange  physician,'     . 
You  cannot  run  away  from,  . 

'You  fret  against  the  common 
law,' 

You  know  it  very  well,  it  cannot, 

You  should  have  beard  him 
speak 

you  think  that  pity, 

Youth  is  the  time  to  go  flashing,  . 


Lay  Morals, 


70 


Weir  ofHermiston,     .  50 
Will  o'  the  Mill,  .       .  196 
The    Amateur    Emi- 
grant,        ...  74 


Olalla  .....    ,53 
Weir  ofHermiston,    .    143 


Beggars,        ...  3 

St.  Ives  .....  161 
Crabbed      Aft      and 

Youth,        ,        ,        ,  45 


THE  BIOGRAPHICAL  EDITION 
OF  STEVENSON'S  WORKS 


NOVELS  AND  ROMANCES 
TREASURE  ISLAND 
PRINCE  OTTO 
KIDNAPPED 
THE  BLACK  ARROW 
THE  MASTER  OF  BALLANTRAB 
THE  WRONG  BOX 
THE  WRECKER 
DAVID  BALFOUR 

THE  EBB-TIDE  / 

WEIR  OF  HERMISTOM 
ST.  IVES 

SHORTER  STORIES 
NEW  ARABIAN  NIGHTS 
THE  DYNAMITER 
THE  MERRY  MEN.  containing  DR.  JEKVLL 

AND  MR.  HYDE 
ISLAND  NIGHTS'  ENTERTAINMENTS 

ESS  A  VS,  TRA  VELS  &  SKETCHES 
AN  INLAND  VOYAGE 
TRAVELS  WITH  A  DONKEY 
VIRGINIUt^  PUER1SQUE 
FAMILIAR  STUDIES 
THE  AMATEUR  EMIGRANT,  containing  THE 

SILVERADO  SQUATTERS 
MEMORIES  AND  PORTRAITS 
IN  THE  SOUTH  SEAS 
ACROSS  THE  PLAINS 
ESSAYS  OF  TRAVEL  AND  IN  THE  ART  OP 

WRITING 
LAY  MORALS  AND  OTHER  PAPERS 

POEMS 
COMPLETE  POEMS  _ 

THE  LETTERS  OF  ROBERT  LOUIS 

STEVENSON.     4  vols. 

THE  LIFE  OF  ROBERT  LOUIS  STEVENSON 
By  O*ahan»  Balfour.    Abridged  Edition  la  one  volume 

,       _ 

Thirty-one  -volumes.     Sold  singly  or  in  sets 
Per  -volume.  Cloth,  $1.35  net;  Limp  Leather,  $1.60  net 

SCRIBNER'S  SONS,  NEW  YORK 


I 

Thirty 
Per  -volume. 

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